DIMENSIONS OF URINE LOSS AMONG OLDER WOMEN WITH GENUINE STRESS-INCONTINENCE

The specific maneuvers that cause women to be incontinent can become i mportant diagnostic aids and major factors in differentiating the effe ctiveness of the current pharmacological, surgical, and behavioral tre atments for urinary incontinence. The purpose of this study was to eva luate whether meaningful dimensions could be identified within the mul tiple movements that produce urine loss in stress-incontinent women. T he Stress Incontinence Questionnaire (SIQ) was constructed from items derived from a compilation of studies and reports of urinary incontine nce experts. An exploratory factor analysis using maximum likelihood m ethod of extraction and a varimax rotation procedure identified four d imensions: active maneuvers, passive maneuvers, planned maneuvers, and unplanned maneuvers. The alpha coefficients for the four identified f actors were acceptable and ranged from .71 to .79, with 8-week test-re test correlations for the active (r = .87), passive (r = .87), planned (r = .85), and the unplanned maneuvers (r = .60) all highly significa nt. The four factors also showed differential patterns of relationship s with various gynecologic and urologic measures. These latter finding s suggest that the factors identified in this study may be acknowledgi ng different types or components of stress incontinence. In either cas e, the findings may have implications for treatment approaches to stre ss incontinence. Further research is needed to substantiate the variou s components of stress incontinence found in this study and the implic ations these findings may have for treatment of incontinence.