Quality of life and sexual function in postmenopausal women with urinary incontinence

Introduction: Aging is a natural unavoidable process that is expressed through physical, psychological, emotional, and social changes, and that can produce undesirable events, such as Urinary Incontinence (UI). This condition increases with age, is more frequent in women, and can produce impairments in the quality of life, such as social isolation, fear, embarrassment, and self-postponement, among others. This research aimed at describing the quality of life and sexual function in postmenopausal women according to the UI classification through the application of specific questionnaires. Material and Method: This is a descriptive and cross-sectional study carried out between June and September, 2006. This study included 46 postmenopausal women over 50 years old with clinical and urodynamic diagnosis of UI, active sexual life in the last 3 months. All the subjects answered the King's Health Questionnaire (KHQ) and Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI). Results: According to the UI classification, 43.5% showed Mixed UI, 37% Stress UI, and 19.6% Urge UI. The most affected domains in the total of the subjects in regards to Quality of Life were "UI impact" (65.2%), "activities performed" (56.5%), and the less affected domain was "personal relations" (15.2%). The most affected UI classification in the KHQ domains was Mixed UI (43.5%), which indicates a greater impairment of the quality of life. The most prevalent disorders of the female sexual function were: decrease of "sexual desire" (45.7%) and "excitation" (30.4%), and the less affected domains were "satisfaction" (8.7%) and "pain" (6.5%). The classification of UI that showed the lower punctuations in FSFI was the Mixed UI. Conclusion: UI affects quality of life and sexual function being the mixed UI the classification that showed the greatest influence compared to the other two types. Due to the UI is a highly-treatable condition, a comprehensive assessment of these patients is needed, under a bio-psycho-social model, having as central paradigm the improvement of the quality of life, considering the perception of the patients themselves.