EFFECT OF A HEALTH EDUCATION INTERVENTION ON CONTROLLING OF URINARY INCONTINENCE AMONG ELDERLY WOMEN IN ZAGAZIG CITY

Background: urinary incontinence is a significant health problem with serious physical, psychological and social consequences, particularly among elderly women.   Self-care is one way that individuals can use to cope with physical symptoms, and stress.  Aim: to assess the knowledge, physical and psychological complaints of urinary incontinence in elderly women, and to evaluate the outcome of a self-care management intervention of urinary incontinence.  Subjects and Methods: the study was conducted at the geriatric social club in ZagazigCity, using a quasi-experimental design with pre-post assessment. It included 50 women, 60 years old or above, with urinary incontinence for at least one year.  They were divided into two equal groups, a study group for application of the intervention, and a control group.  Three tools were used for data collection: an interview questionnaire form, a knowledge assessment sheet, and a voiding training record. A health education intervention for voiding training was provided to subjects in the intervention group for six-months.  Data were collected during the period from June to December 2004.  Results: Before the intervention the medical history and independence in daily life activities were similar in the two groups, and also their psychological complaints.  They had no differences of statistical significance concerning knowledge about urinary incontinence, which was very low in the two groups.  After the intervention, statistically significant improvement in knowledge was found in the study group.  Before the intervention the frequency of wetting underwear showed no differences between the two groups.  After the intervention, the frequencies were markedly lower in the study group, especially after the third day, where the means were all below 3 times, compared to more than 4 times in the control group.  Similarly, a significant increase in the frequency of using WC was shown among women in the study group after the intervention. Conclusion: there is a lack of knowledge about the condition. Implementation of a health education intervention proved to an effective self-care practice for management of the problem.  Recommendations: elderly people need periodic screening of for early detection and management of urinary incontinence. Nurses (either community or psychiatric) needed to be trained in more specialized aspect of care of incontinence elderly including health education intervention about how to mange incontinence. Health education for elderly are needed about self care management of incontinence, mass media could provide both the public and patient social support to the elderly by accurate information about management of incontinence.