Understanding catheter users' views
We needed to understand the important issues for intermittent catheter users as well as to verify the signs and symptoms they may experience when they have a urinary tract infection.
Identifying the advantages and disadvantages of different intermittent catheterisation strategies: We interviewed men and women who use intermittent catheterisation from GP practices in the south of England about their experiences of catheter use and their thoughts about the pros and cons of both single-use and multi-use catheters. The information gathered in these interviews was compared with information gathered in interviews with people in the USA who re-use catheters. In this way we identified the most important advantages and disadvantges with both single-use and multi-use of catheters. This helped us to develop a set of questions to use during the Trial to assess and compare the experiences and satisfaction of participants using either single-use catheters only or mixed-use (single-use and multi-use catheters) Read more here.
Verifying signs and symptoms of urinary tract infection: During the Trial we will be assessing the number of symptomatic urinary tract infections experienced in the two study groups. Not all urinary tract infections are symptomatic. Sometimes laboratory tests can detect the presence of infection even though no symptoms are experienced. But for those who use intermittent catheterisation, small microbiological differences that may exist between single-use or re-use are not important as long as any such differences do not mean an increased risk of a noticeable or “symptomatic” infection. Symptomatic urinary tract infections are infections that are confirmed microbiologically AND that cause patients to experience a symptom that alerts them to the presence of an infection and act upon it (for example, by seeking medical help, self-medicating or increasing the amount of fluids that they drink).
During the interviews we also asked intermittent catheterisation users about their experience of urinary tract infections, and what alerts them to the possible presence of infection and makes them take action such as seeking medical help or increasing fluid intake. From this information we have developed a set of symptoms that participants will be asked to report during the Trial Read more here.
This website refers to independent research funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) under its Programme Grants for Applied Research (PGfAR) Programme (Grant Reference Number RP-PG-0610-10078). The views expressed are those of the research team and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health.