Associação entre incontinência urinária e saúde percebida em mulheres do nordeste brasileiro: um estudo transversal

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the association between urinary incontinence (UI) and self-reported health (SRH) in middle-aged and elderly community-dwelling women in northeastern Brazil. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted with community-dwelling women aged between 40 and 80. UI in the last 7 days (yes or no) and SRH (good or bad health) were collected through self-report. UI was further divided into stress UI and urgency UI. The associations between UI of any type, stress UI, and urgency UI and SRH were assessed using binary logistic regression adjusted for potential covariates. To assess whether the associations differ concerning age group, an interaction term between age group (40 to 59 years and 60 or over) was added to the models. RESULTS: 571 women were assessed, with a median age of 53.0 years. Those who reported UI of any type were more likely to report a poor SRH (OR= 1.53, p=0.05). When considering the types of UI, only stress UI remained significantly associated with SRH (OR= 1.72, p=0.02). The interaction between UI and age group was not significant, showing that the relationships found are independent of age group. CONCLUSION: Women with any type of UI were more likely to report poor SRH. When divided into urge or stress UI, the group of women with stress UI was 1.72 times more likely to rate their health as poor.