Prevalence of asymptomatic urinary abnormalities among adolescents

To determine the prevalence of asymptomatic urinary abnormalities in adolescents, first morning clean mid-stream urine specimens were obtained from 2500 individuals and examined by dipstick and light microscopy. Adolescents with abnormal screening results were reexamined after two weeks and those who had abnormal results twice were subjected to systemic clinical examination and further clinical and laboratory investigations. Eight hundred and three (32.1%) individuals had urinary abnormalities at the first screening, which significantly decreased to 345 (13.8%) at the second screening, (P <0.001). Hematuria was the most common urinary abnormalities detected in 245 (9.8%) adolescents who had persistent urine abnormalities; 228 (9.1%) individuals had non glomerular hematuria. The hematuria was isolated in 150 (6%) individuals, combined with leukocyturia in 83 (3.3%) individuals, and combined with proteinuria in 12 (0.5%) individuals. Leukocyturia was detected in 150 (6%) of all studied adolescents; it was isolated in 39 (1.6%) individuals and combined with proteinuria in 28 (1.1%) of them. Asymptomatic bacteriuria was detected in 23 (0.9%) of all studied adolescents; all the cases were females. Proteinuria was detected in 65 (2.6%) of all the studied adolescents; 45 (1.8%) individuals had <0.5 g/day and twenty (0.8%) individuals had 0.5-3 g/day. Asymptomatic urinary abnormalities were more common in males than females and adolescents from rural than urban areas (P <0.01) and (P <0.001), respectively. The present study found a high prevalence of asymptomatic urinary abnormalities among adolescents in our population.