Clinical Evaluation of a Prototype Underwear Designed to Detect Urine Leakage From Continence Pads.

Purpose: We evaluated the performance of prototype underwear designed to detect urine leakage from continence pads, their acceptability to users, and their effect on health-related quality of life and psychosocial factors.

Design: Prototype product evaluation.

Subjects And Setting: Participants were 81 women with an average age of 67 years (range, 32-98 years) recruited between October 2010 and February 2012 from outpatient clinics, general practice surgeries, community continence services, and through charities and networks.

Development and psychometric evaluation of the ICIQ-LTCqol: A self-report quality of life questionnaire for long-term indwelling catheter users.

Aims: Long-term indwelling catheterisation may affect health related quality of life, but clinical assessment and monitoring of people with indwelling catheters is poorly recorded because there are no validated measures to capture these criteria. In this paper, we describe the development of the ICIQ-Long Term Catheter quality of life (ICIQ-LTCqol), one of the modules of the ICIQ series, an international project to standardise assessment of lower pelvic dysfunction: www.iciq.

Living with a long-term, indwelling urinary catheter: catheter users' experience.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of long-term catheter users within a heterogeneous population.

Subjects And Settings: The sample comprised 27 community-dwelling long-term catheter users. Participants included 14 female users (4 urethral, 10 suprapubic catheter) and 13 male users (6 urethral, 7 suprapubic) between 22 and 96 years of age.

Does nurse self-testing affect catheter choice?

Background: Involving patients in decision making about their care requires expert knowledge and understanding of patients' perspectives. Knowledge comes from several sources and experience; however, the self-testing of products by health professionals who teach clean intermittent self-catheterisation (CISC) has not been investigated.

Aim: This study aimed to assess the impact of self-testing on catheter evaluation by continence nurses.

A clinical evaluation of a sensor to detect blockage due to crystalline biofilm formation on indwelling urinary catheters.

Objective: To test the performance and acceptability of an early warning sensor to predict encrustation and blockage of long-term indwelling urinary catheters.

Patients And Methods: In all, 17 long-term indwelling catheter users, 15 'blockers' and two 'non-blockers' (controls) were recruited; 11 participants were followed prospectively until catheter change, three withdrew early and three did not start. Two sensors were placed in series between the catheter and the urine bag at catheter change.

An exploration of the hydration care of older people: a qualitative study.

Background: Older adults are more susceptible to water imbalance and ensuring they drink sufficiently is a complex and challenging issue for nurses. The factors that promote adequate hydration and the barriers which prevent older people from drinking are not well understood.

Objective: This study aimed to understand the complexity of issues associated with the hydration and hydration care of older people.

Developing a new treatment device: how to get an idea to the marketplace.

A good idea does not inevitably lead to successful innovation; it needs additional "drivers" and coherent activity of a specialized team. The initial idea needs proof-of-concept and prototype testing. Alongside, market review must anticipate future need and competitors, and ensure that no current patents are infringed.

In vitro multicompartmental bladder model for assessing blockage of urinary catheters: effect of hydrogel coating on dynamics of Proteus mirabilis growth.

Objectives: To investigate the effect of a hydrogel coating on the dynamics of bacterial growth in laboratory models of the catheterized bladder. Infection of the urinary tract by Proteus mirabilis can result in catheter blockage by crystalline biofilm, a common complication in patients undergoing long-term bladder catheterization.

Methods: Two series of catheters were tested in the infected bladder models: test series 1, silicone catheters impregnated with triclosan (0.

Neuropeptide expression following constriction or section of the inferior alveolar nerve in the ferret.

Some of the sensory abnormalities that follow peripheral nerve injury may result from the development of ectopic discharge from the damaged axons. Previous studies in our laboratory have shown that, following tight ligation of the inferior alveolar nerve (IAN), there is a close association between the time-course of this neural activity and the accumulation of neuropeptides at the injury site. In this study we investigated whether the type of injury has any effect on the time-course or level of neuropeptide expression.