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- Asklund, Ina, et al.
(author)
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Pregnant and postnatal women’s usage of an app with a pelvic floor muscle training program for the prevention and treatment of urinary incontinence.
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Other publication (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Introduction: Pregnancy and childbirth are risk factors for developing urinary incontinence (UI). The prevalence of UI has been reported at 58% in late pregnancy and at around 30% in the three months after childbirth. Pelvic floor muscle training (PFMT) during pregnancy can prevent the onset of UI. We developed the mobile app Tät with a PFMT program for women with stress urinary incontinence. We evaluated its efficacy in a randomized controlled trial and found that the app group experienced fewer incontinence symptoms, fewer leakages, and better quality of life compared to the control group. The app is now freely available, and the aim of this study was to investigate the use of the app by pregnant and postnatal women.Methods: We included pregnant and postnatal (childbirth in the last three months) women who had downloaded the app between January 16 and November 15 2018 and answered the inclusion questionnaire within the app. Questions included age, gender, country, place of residence, education, reason for download, pregnancy, childbirth in the last three months, and incontinence symptoms according to the ICIQ-UI SF. After three months a follow-up questionnaire appeared in the app. All answers were sent anonymously to our research database.Results: 10 456 women were included (4 607 pregnant, 5 849 postnatal). The mean age was 31 years and 95% lived in Sweden. 47% of the pregnant women and 55% of the postnatal women reported having UI. The mean ICIQ-UI SF score of those with UI was 6.7 (SD 3.4). 1 805 women answered the follow-up and almost three quarters had used the app and performed PFMT at least weekly. Of those with incontinence, the majority experienced improvement with mean ICIQ-UI SF scores improving significantly at follow-up, except in the subgroup “pregnant both at inclusion and follow-up”.Conclusion: The Tät app is widely used by pregnant and postnatal women in Sweden for prevention and treatment of UI. Postnatal women with incontinence experienced the largest improvements and reductions in ICIQ-UI SF score. With this study design we cannot say if this effect relates to the use of the app or is the natural improvement of UI over time.
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