Neutral posture education during cough can reduce urine leakage in women with cough-related stress urinary incontinence.

BACKGROUND: Current literature highlights the difficulty in identifying an optimal educational technique for maintaining continence during cough. OBJECTIVE: To characterize the effects of an educational intervention focusing on neutral posture during cough in women with cough-induced urinary incontinence (UI). METHODS: This interventional study design included women with cough-induced UI. We recorded PFMs surface electromyographic (sEMG) peak activity, and assessed symptoms and quality of life (QoL) 6 weeks after the intervention. The effect of the experimental situation was estimated using a linear mixed model, sEMG measurements during coughing were indexed to each situation and adjusted to the resting value at, and a moderation analysis was used. RESULTS/FINDINGS: Eighteen participants were included. The measurement situations (control versus experimental) did not have a statistically significant impact on sEMG peak activity during coughing: mean effect [95% CI] 3.42 [-1.28; 7.66]. Six weeks post-intervention, participants reported statistically significant decrease in urinary symptoms (P=0.0246) and significant improvement in QoL (P=0.00776). This was also particularly marked on the dimension related to effort activities (P=0.00162). CONCLUSION: This study suggests that a brief educational intervention focusing on neutral posture during cough, without voluntary pre-contraction of the PFMs, has no clinically significant influence on sEMG peak activity of the PFMs in women with cough-induced UI. However, this intervention can lead to a significant improvement in urinary symptoms and QoL at 6 weeks. These improvements seem to be independent of electromyographic PFMs peak activity recorded during cough. As such, our preliminary results pave the way for future research. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: NP4.