Prostatism symptoms in a randomly selected population: introduction of a patient administered population based...

A questionnaire concerning micturition symptoms and bother was answered by 2559 (66%) randomly selected males. Voiding problems increased with age from about 4 to 40%. The symptoms were weakly but significantly correlated to each other (rs < 0.55). The ability of a particular symptom question to predict whether a subject actually would seek a doctor was generally low. A score system with a maximum score of 33 points was constructed. If prostatism was defined as a certain score or higher, a change in the definition in the score interval 4-10 would change the number of subjects with this syndrome with approximately 10%/score point. As a consequence of the results, the use of a symptom score as a criterion for the decision to treat patients suffering from prostatism is challenged. A patient administered symptom evaluation from is strongly recommended to obtain a more objective symptom registration.