Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms, Quality of Life and Pelvic Organ Prolapse: Irritative Bladder and Obstructive Voiding Symptoms in Women Planning to Undergo Abdominal Sacrocolpopexy for Advanced Pelvic Organ Prolapse

Purpose: We compared lower urinary tract and voiding symptoms in women with and without symptoms of stress urinary incontinence who were planning to undergo abdominal sacrocolpopexy for pelvic organ prolapse. Materials and Methods: Subjects without stress urinary incontinence included 293 women in the Colpopexy and Urinary Reduction Efforts Trial. Subjects with stress urinary incontinence included 82 women who met trial inclusion criteria except for having stress urinary incontinence symptoms. We assessed symptoms and quality of life using validated measures. Results: After adjusting for age, race and site subjects with stress urinary incontinence had higher irritative and obstructive symptom subscale scores and reported greater symptom bother, greater impact of colorectal and prolapse symptoms, and poorer physical and mental health. Conclusions: Women with prolapse and stress urinary incontinence had more lower urinary tract symptoms and reported more functional impact. This is contrary to our hypothesis that women with prolapse and stress urinary incontinence would have fewer irritative, obstructive and voiding symptoms because of the relief valve effect of the less resistant urethra.