(HealthDay News) — For women with overactive bladder (OAB), percutaneous tibial nerve stimulation (PTNS) is associated with improvement of symptoms, according to a study published online in the Journal of Clinical Medicine.
Connor McPhail, from FBW Gynaecology Plus in Adelaide, Australia, and colleagues conducted a prospective cohort study to examine the long-term efficacy of PTNS treatment for OAB. Women with OAB received PTNS once per week for 12 weeks in phase 1 and then received 12 PTNS treatments over 6 months in phase 2. A total of 166 women were included in phase 1 and 51 completed phase 2.
The researchers found that compared to baseline, there was a significant reduction in urinary urgency, nocturia, incontinence, and frequency (improvements of 29.8%, 29.8%, 31.0%, and 33.8%, respectively). A significant reduction in urinary frequency (improvement of 56.5%) was also seen for patients who completed phase 2.
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“This study should promote future investigation into the long-term maintenance of the therapeutic benefit of PTNS in the Australian setting, particularly looking at patient demographics to find out who experienced symptomatic improvements, and possibly a comparative study between the benefits and cost of PTNS and surgical treatments, such as intradetrusor injections,” the authors write.
