Overactive bladder ‘symptoms’ or ‘complaints’ in young and elderly patients or healthy volunteers?

Objective: The overactive bladder symptom complex is multifactorial and heterogeneously influenced by genetic and environmental factors. The role of ageing is not exactly known. Our objective is to evaluate age-related differences in bladder sensations in healthy volunteers and overactive bladder patients. Methods: 68 patients with an overactive bladder, diagnosed by their urologist using the International Continence Society criteria, and 66 healthy volunteers were included: 41 patients and 20 volunteers were =60 years old. Subjects filled out sensation-related bladder diaries, for 2 periods of 3 days. Results: To obtain the following results, 6160 voids were assessed. Both young and older healthy volunteers experienced storage symptoms. However, older volunteers experienced more symptoms than younger ones. The healthy aged experienced more nocturia and voided 34% more often over 6 days, compared to the young people. They experienced more urge at a lower mean voided volume too. Younger OAB patients perceived their bladder to be ~25% fuller at 100 ml compared to younger volunteers, older patients experienced a similar mean bladder fullness sensation to their healthy peers. Fourteen healthy older volunteers experienced voids with urge 3 (need to void now), however at a higher mean voided volume compared to the older OAB patients. They both experienced the same amount of nocturia. Conclusions: Storage symptoms are widespread throughout the population in a continuum of frequency and severity of symptoms. Ageing healthy volunteers shift on this continuum, from never having any urinary complaints towards experiencing (a severity of) symptoms that fit within the ICS definition of OAB. Hence, there is an important distinction between storage symptoms and storage complaints.