Pelvic floor muscle activation and strength components influencing female urinary continence and stress incontinence: A systematic review

Luginbuehl, Helena; Baeyens, Jean-Pierre; Taeymans, Jan; Maeder, Ida-Maria; Kuhn, Annette; Radlinger, Lorenz (2015). Pelvic floor muscle activation and strength components influencing female urinary continence and stress incontinence: A systematic review. Neurourology and urodynamics, 34(6), pp. 498-506. Wiley-Liss 10.1002/nau.22612

Text nau22612.pdf - Published Version Restricted to registered users only Available under License Publisher holds Copyright. Download (144kB)

AIMS

A better understanding of pelvic floor muscle (PFM) activation and strength components is a prerequisite to get better insight in PFM contraction mechanisms and develop more specific PFM-training regimens for female stress urinary incontinence (SUI) patients. The aim of this systematic review (2012:CRD42012002547) was to evaluate and summarize existing studies investigating PFM activation and strength components influencing female continence and SUI.

METHODS

PubMed, EMBASE, and Cochrane databases were systematically searched for literature from January 1980 to November 2013 for cross-sectional studies comparing female SUI patients with healthy controls and intervention studies with SUI patients reporting on the association between PFM activation and strength components and urine loss. Trial characteristics, evaluated PFM components, their definitions, measurement methods, study outcomes, as well as quality measures, based on the Cochrane risk of bias tool, were independently extracted. The high heterogeneity of the retrieved data made pooling of results impossible and therefore restricted the analysis to a systematic review.

RESULTS

Cross-sectional studies showed group differences in favor of the continent women compared to SUI patients for PFM activation or PFM maximal strength, mean strength or sustained contraction. All intervention studies showed an improvement of PFM strength and decrease in urine loss in SUI patients after physical therapy.

CONCLUSIONS

Higher PFM activation and strength components influence female continence positively. This systematic review underscored the need for a standardized PFM components' terminology (similar to rehabilitation and training science), standardized test procedures and well matched diagnostic instruments. Neurourol. Urodynam. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Interest & Impact

Downloads

0 since deposited on 13 May 2015
0 in the past 12 months

Citations

5 Citations in Web of Science ®
6 Citations in Scopus

Search

in Google Scholar™

Services

Actions (login required)

Edit item

Actions (login required)

Edit item