Hulagu Kaptan^1*, Haluk Kulaksızoğlu², Ömür Kasımcan³, Bedreddin Seçkin⁴

¹Dokuz Eylül University, Medical Faculty, Department of Neurosurgery, Izmir, Turkey; ²Bilim University, Medical Faculty, Department of Urology, Konya, Turkey; ³Liv Hospital, Department of Neurosurgery, Istanbul, Turkey; ⁴Medicana Hospital, Department of Urology, Ankara, Turkey

AIM: Urinary incontinence (UI) is a common dysfunction, affecting especially women of all ages. The terminology of low back pain (LBP) and radiculopathy (RP) may be misused interchangeably with each other. There are many reports of the association with LBP and incontinence but those involving compression of nerve root(as RP), has not been distinguished from isolated low back pain. This study was structured to analyse the association of UI, LBP and RP.

METHODS: One hundred twenty patients were included in the study. Patients with spinal or urinary infection, tumour (spinal or others), cauda equine, pelvic operation, spinal trauma, spinal surgery, urogenital pathology were not accepted for this study. Age and weight of all patients were determined. Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) was utilised for assessment of loss of function and SEAPI incontinence index was used for urinary incontinence. All patients were examined for neurological pathology to differentiate between the LBP and RP by department of neurosurgery. Student t-test and Mann-Whitney-U tests were used for statistical significance.

RESULTS: There was no statistical significance between low back pain with overall urinary incontinence (p = 0.131), urge (p = 0.103) or stress incontinence (p = 0.68), respectively. However; The statistical aspects were identified relationship between overall (p = 0.026) and urge (p = 0.001) urinary incontinence with radiculopathy. The association of urge incontinence and radiculopathy seems to show a more significant relationship. Yet there was no correlation between radiculopathy and stress incontinence (P = 0.062).

Citation: Kaptan H, Kulaksızoğlu H, Kasımcan O, Seçkin B. The Association between Urinary Incontinence and Low Back Pain and Radiculopathy in Women. Open Access Maced J Med Sci. http://dx.doi.org/10.3889/oamjms.2016.129
Keywords: Urinary incontinence; low back pain; radiculopathy; urge incontinence; stress incontinence.
*Correspondence: Hülagü KAPTAN, MD, Assoc. Prof. Department of Neurosurgery, Dokuz Eylül University, Medical Faculty, Inciralti, 35340 Izmir, Türkiye. Tel: +90 505 398 87 02. E-mail: hulagukaptan@yahoo.com
Received: 22-Sep-2016; Revised: 05-Nov-2016; Accepted: 06-Nov-2016; Online first: 30-Nov-2016
Copyright: © 2016 Hulagu Kaptan, Haluk Kulaksızoğlu, Ömür Kasımcan, Bedreddin Seçkin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).
Funding: This research did not receive any financial support.
Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Abbreviations: Urinary Incontinence (UI); Low Back Pain (LBP); Radiculopathy (RP); Oswestry Disability Index (ODI).
 

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