Pictorial Urgency Scale: A New Tool for Evaluating Bladder Urgency in Children

Bladder fullness and urgency are difficult for some patients to express. We hypothesized that images on a pictorial urgency scale would correlate with International Continence Society standard verbal descriptors and bladder volume.

The study population consisted of 267 toilet trained children with a mean age of 7.2 years and their parents (91 adults). Patients were excluded if they had a history of urinary infection, voiding dysfunction, genitourinary surgery or reflux. Participants were read each of the 4 descriptors and asked to point to an image. Correlation between descriptors and figures was analyzed using a mixed effects proportional odds logistic regression model (aim 1 of study). In addition, 73 children undergoing voiding cystourethrography were asked to point to the images during bladder filling. Correlation between percent of expected capacity and image was analyzed using a linear mixed effects model (aim 2 of study).

Correlation between descriptors and images (aim 1) was 0.87 (95% CI 0.84 to 0.89) for all participants, 0.84 (95% CI 0.81 to 0.88) for patients younger than age 6 years and 0.88 (95% CI 0.85 to 0.90) for patients 6 to 17 years old. Sequencing of the images was appropriate for increasing degree of urgency. In 73 children undergoing voiding cystourethrography correlation between image and percent of expected capacity (aim 2) was 0.75 (95% CI 0.67 to 0.81, p <0.001).

Figures on the pictorial urgency scale correlate with standard verbal descriptors and bladder volume. The pictorial scale could be a supplemental tool to improve communication of urgency sensation in younger children.