2024/03/18 by Antônia Mykaele Cordeiro Brandão, Sávia Francisca Lopes Dias, Maria Gabriela Cardoso Teles Monteiro +5 · 1 voice
Medicine · #Pelvic floor disorders treatments
paper · pdf · doi:10.17267/2965-3738bis.2024.e5381
openalex publication_date 2024/03/18 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/11
INTRODUCTION: Pelvic floor muscle training (PFMT) is widely regarded as the most conservative and effective non-pharmacological treatment option for women suffering from urinary incontinence (UI). Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a non-invasive, non-pharmacological neuromodulation technique that has demonstrated promising results in a variety of medical conditions. However, there has been little research into the feasibility of tDCS as an adjunct therapy to PFMT in improving symptoms in women with UI. OBJECTIVE: To explore the feasibility (recruitment and retention) of tDCS as an adjunct therapy to PFMT to relieve symptoms of female UI. METHODS AND MATERIALS: Eleven female patients were randomly assigned to receive 12 non-consecutive sessions of PFMT combined with 20 minutes (2mA) of anodal (Cz) or sham tDCS for 4 weeks. Feasibility (primary outcome) was assessed through recruitment and retention rates. Secondary outcomes included four domains: (1) urinary leakage, (2) severity of incontinence, (3) impact on quality of life, and (4) symptoms and adverse events. RESULTS: Eleven patients were evaluated, and nine women completed the treatment protocol. The recruitment rate was 100%, and retention was 81.8%. Clinical results showed that anodal tDCS is viable as adjunctive therapy to PFMT protocol and may result in minimal clinically important differences (MCID) in UI symptoms. CONCLUSION: The high rate of recruitment and retention indicates that tDCS in combination with PFMT is a feasible adjunct therapy for female UI treatment. This research supports the recommendation for a full RCT, with prioritization of outcomes required for hypothesis testing.