Care-seeking behaviors and risk factors in women with postpartum urinary incontinence

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Source: Frontiers Medicine

Original: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmed.2025.1710600...

Published: 2025-12-01T00:00:00Z

The study investigated the attitudes and care-seeking behavior of Saudi women regarding postpartum urinary incontinence (PPUI) in a sample of 813 women. She found that more than 20% of participants perceived PPUI as significantly interfering with their daily lives. The majority of women (56.5%) considered incontinence to be a normal consequence of childbirth, and approximately two-thirds (67.3%) perceived it as a temporary condition that would disappear over time. Although 66.4% of women with PPUI did not seek medical care, symptom severity was significantly associated with help-seeking—56.1% of those who did seek care reported severe or extremely severe incontinence. Approximately 34.9% of women preferred to seek advice from their parents. The study also revealed that a lack of accurate knowledge about PPUI and its risk factors exists even among highly educated women, pointing to a gap in health education and awareness.