Lower urinary tract dysfunction and comprehensive geriatric assessment in the elderly.

Abstract

In the elderly, various factors except the urological abnormality of lower urinary tracts often participate in the lower urinary tract dysfunction. The elderly person often causes the change of the general systemic function (basic ability for daily living activity, a cognitive func- tion, emotion or feeling). In addition, the condition such as frailty and sarcopenia are ob- served in considerably high rate in the elderly. Such conditions may have an influence on the lower urinary tract dysfunction and adversely lower urinary tract dysfunction may cause the aggravation of a systemic function. Therefore, in the medical care of the elderly with lower urinary tract dysfunction, we have to take care of not only urological disease but also general systemic condition. In this review, I describe characteristic conditions in the elderly such as frailty and sarcopenia, and introduce the comprehensive geriatric assessment, which is the necessary tool for evaluation and treatment of lower urinary tract dysfunction in the elderly.