Diagnosis

Female Urinary Incontinence

Diagnosis

For the diagnosis of female urinary incontinence, the physician should inquire about the timing of urine leakage to detect whether incontinence is predominantly stress incontinence or incontinence due to running to the toilet.

Questionnaires

We have questionnaires and a diary that is given to patients to indicate in which situations they leak urine and in what quantity. This helps us to see the impact of these leaks.

To reliably quantify the amount of urine leaking per day, it is necessary to emphasize that the person is living a normal life. If at the moment when we are quantifying urine leakage, the patient with suspected stress urinary incontinence stops doing her activities for fear of suffering leakage, she may have less leakage than she would have in a normal life, making it very difficult to make an accurate quantification.

Urinalysis with culture

As urinary incontinence is often associated with urinary tract infections, a urinalysis with culture is performed to rule out this very prevalent pathology.

Ultrasound

An ultrasound will be performed to identify that there is nothing basic, such as a stone in the bladder or some kind of alteration in the emptying, since most of them are older people, there may be prolapse of the bladder or uterus, also causing urine leakage.

Urodynamic study

Urodynamic study is not necessary in all patients. This test tells us, subjectively, how the urinary incontinence is and helps a lot to distinguish the type of incontinence.

Normally, the following diagnostic tests are performed to rule out another condition, but with a good medical history and questionnaires we can arrive at an accurate diagnosis.