MS Bladder Problems Show Up Early and Often

Published: May 30, 2014

By John Gever, Deputy Managing Editor, MedPage Today

DALLAS — Nearly 80% of multiple sclerosis patients in a large registry reported overactive bladder symptoms, and more than one-third of newly diagnosed patients in a different cohort also had urinary dysfunction, researchers reported here.

Analysis of questionnaires returned by 8,380 participants in the registry operated by the North American Committee on MS (NARCOMS) indicated that 6,392 of them reported overactive bladder — including 5,159 who said they had urgency-related leakage, according to Stacey S. Cofield, PhD, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and colleagues.

However, barely half had ever seen a urologist for their symptoms, the researchers reported during a poster session at the joint meeting of the Consortium of Multiple Sclerosis Centers and the Americas Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis (CMSC-ACTRIMS).

In part because a recent history of urinary tract infections was relatively common in patients with “wet” overactive bladder — who had a mean of 0.85 infections in the past 6 months, compared with 0.56 on average among those with “dry” symptoms and 0.47 without any — Cofield and colleagues suggested that patients with urgency-related leakage “may benefit from more specialty care.”

In the study of newly diagnosed patients, Emily Riser, MD, and colleagues at the Tanner Center for MS in Birmingham found that 38% (13 of 34 recruited at initial MS diagnosis) had post-voiding urinary retention (at least 50 mL after urinating) as measured by ultrasound scan.

The same 13 patients all showed some degree of ambulatory impairment as well, with 25-foot walk times greater than the “normal” of 2.2 seconds. Four of these patients had 25-foot walk times in excess of 5 seconds, indicating significant impairment, Riser and colleagues reported.

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