The Urinary Function Among Colorectal Cancer Patients After Surgery

Purpose: The urinary function which was influencing by colorectal cancer surgery has been reported by literatures, but rare study to explore this issues in colorectal cancer patient underwent surgery in Taiwan. The purpose of this study was to understand the urinary function and also identified the influencing factor of among colorectal cancer patients following colorectal surgery (CRS).

Methods: A cross-sectional design and chart review was first used to identify 621 patients who diagnosed colorectal cancer and underwent a CRS from a 1766-bed hospital in southern Taiwan. Then, a self-report questionnaire was mailed to patients between August 2013 and June 2015, with 232 responses (response rate 37.4%). The following instruments were used: the International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS) Scale, personal features (such as, age. gender, educational level, BMI, marital status, etc.), and disease related variables (such as, cancer staging, length of stay in hospital, duration since surgery, urinary tract infection, urinary incontinence, knowledge related LUS after surgery, perceived physical recovery status, and satisfied with physical recovery, etc. ). The IPSS scale included 7 items to measure the urination function status, and one item to measure patients’ urinary specific quality of life.

Results:

The degree of low urinary symptom (LUS) was 57.3% (133/232) for mild LUS, 33.2% (77/232) for moderate LUS, and 9.5% (22/232) for severe LUS. The mean score of LUS and quality of life related urination were 8.18 (SD=7.23), and 2.17 (SD=1.10), which indicated that overall patients experiencing moderate LUS and satisfied their quality of life. The stepwise regression model showed three factors were the predictors of LUS, included perceived physical recovery status (7.9%), urinary incontinence (7.1%), and educational years (3.7%), and account for 17.1% total variance. There are also three factors were the predictors of quality of life, included reporting satisfaction of physical recovery (23.2%), perceived physical recovery status (2.9%), and urinary incontinence (1.9%), and account for 26.5% total variance.

Conclusion: This study show that 42.7% participants have had a moderate to severe low urinary symptoms after CRS. The nurse in clinic should identified and evaluated the influencing factors of LUS after discharge to enhance patients’ urinary function after CRS.