Comparison of urodynamic findings in patients with upper and lower cervical spinal cord injury.

STUDY

DESIGN

Retrospective study.

OBJECTIVES

To analyze the neurogenic bladder characteristics and treatment approaches in patients with upper and lower cervical spinal cord injury (SCI) in order to make proper and reasonable decisions to the relevant patients.

SETTING

Rehabilitation center in Ankara, Turkey.

METHOD: Ninety patients with cervical SCI were included. The urodynamic analyses of the patients were conducted retrospectively by using the urodynamic laboratory records. The patients were divided into two groups as the upper cervical SCI (UCSCI) group (C1-C5) and lower cervical SCI (LCSCI) group (C6-C8).

RESULTS

In this study, 82 male (91.1%) and 8 (8.9%) female patients were included. There were 51 UCSCI patients with the mean age of 34.2 ± 16.1 years and 39 LCSCI patients with the mean age of 30.4 ± 12.5 years. Detrusor overactivity and preservation of the bladder-filling sensation were significantly more frequent in the UCSCI group than in the LCSCI group (P=0.048, P=0.000 respectively). Moreover, there were statistically significant differences between the groups regarding the bladder-emptying methods, residual volume and the frequency of anticholinergic and alpha blocker use (all P<0.05). No significant difference was found between the groups regarding the frequency of autonomic dysreflexia, detrusor hypocompliancy and the bladder-storage and -emptying disorders (all P>0.05).

CONCLUSION

Our results demonstrate that there are differences in the upper and lower SCI cases in terms of neurogenic bladder characteristics and treatment approaches.