Validation of a global pelvic floor symptom bother questionnaire

This study aimed to validate a symptom questionnaire to assess presence and patient bother as related to common pelvic floor disorders. The validation of the Pelvic Floor Bother Questionnaire (PFBQ) included evaluation of internal reliability, test-retest reliability, and validity of the items. A total of 141 patients with mean age of 61.8 +/- 13.2 were included in the study. Twenty-four percent of patients complained of stress urinary incontinence, 14.9% mixed incontinence, 14.9% urge incontinence, 10% fecal incontinence, 5.7% obstructed defecation, 28.4% pelvic organ prolapse, and 2.1% dyspareunia. The PFBQ demonstrated good reliability (alpha = 0.61-0.74; ICC = 0.94). There was a strong agreement beyond chance observed for each question (k = 0.77-0.91). PFBQ correlated with stage of prolapse (rho = 0.73, p < 0.0001), number of urinary and fecal incontinence episodes (rho = 0.81, p < 0.0001; rho = 0.54, p < 0.0001), and obstructed defecation (rho = 0.55, p < 0.0001). The PFBQ is a useful tool that can be easily used for identification and severity or bother assessment of various pelvic floor symptoms.