Genitourinary Dysfunction Prevalence in Parkinson Disease Patients

The goal of this study was to estimate the prevalence of patient-reported genitourinary dysfunction symptoms in Parkinson’s disease patients from the Southeastern Romania.

The study was performed on 86 patients with idiopathic Parkinson’s disease from 5 Outpatients Clinics of Constanta, 56% males, mean age 70.6 years, mean disease duration 6.33 years. The patients have been assessed for the presence of genitourinary symptoms using the Scale for Outcomes in Parkinson’s Disease for Autonomic Symptoms (SCOPA-AUT) as a self-administered questionnaire.

The vast majority of study population (98.8%) reported at least one genitourinary dysfunction. The most common urinary symptom was nocturia (95.3%, 95% CI 90.8-99.7), followed by pollakiuria (82.5%, 95% CI 74.4-90.5), difficulty passing urine and urge to urinate (each present in 76.7% of studied PD patients, 95% CI 67.4-85.3), incomplete bladder emptying (75.5%, 95% CI 66.4-84.5), urinary incontinence (67.4%, 95% CI 57.5-77.3). As frequency, most of the study subjects experienced genitourinary symptoms only “sometimes”. None of the investigated PD patients affected by genitourinary symptoms used specific medication therapy.