THE PREVALENCE OF PROSTATISM - A POPULATION-BASED SURVEY OF URINARY SYMPTOMS

To establish the age-specific prevalence of urinary symptoms among a c ommunity-based cohort of men, a randomly selected sample of men were s creened and invited to participate in a longitudinal survey of urinary symptoms. The population of Olmsted County, Minnesota, as enumerated by the Rochester Epidemiology Project, formed the sampling base for th is study. Men between 40 and 79 years old with no history of prostate or other urological surgery, and who also were free of conditions asso ciated with neurogenic bladder were invited to participate. A previous ly validated questionnaire was completed by the subject. Urine flow me asures, current medications and family histories of urinary disease we re also obtained. Nonresponse corrected scores for a composite of obst ructive symptoms showed moderate to severe symptomatology among 13% of the men 40 to 49 years old and 28% of those older than 70 years. Pros tatism is a highly prevalent symptom complex among unselected men in t he community. The specific urinary symptoms of nocturia, weak stream, restarting, urgency and sensation of incomplete emptying are strongly age-related and, therefore, may be predictive of a prostatic disease p rocess.