Mental factors influencing recurrence of stress incontinence.

At a recent follow-up of 51 women operated on for stress incontinence, there was an astonishingly high discrepancy between symptoms claimed by the patients and signs found by the physician. To examine the influence of certain mental factors on the recurrence of stress incontinence, the patients in the above-mentioned follow-up were tested with the Eysenck Personality Inventory test and the Sabbatsberg Depression Self-rating Scale test. The women with symptoms but no objective signs of stress incontinence showed a higher degree of both neuroticism and depression than the women of perfect health. Thus, in this group, it may be a question of aggravation of symptoms, which cannot be helped by a reoperation. Instead, these women might need psychiatric attention to relieve their psychosomatic symptoms.