• Rian Lelie-van der Zande, Ellen S Koster, Martina Teichert, and Marcel L Bouvy.
• Department of Pharmacoepidemiology and Clinical Pharmacology, Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
• Int. J. Clin. Pract. 2021 Aug 1; 75 (8): e14289.

BackgroundThe guideline on urinary tract infections (UTI) of the Dutch College of General Practitioners provides recommendations on patient-initiated treatment and prevention of recurring UTI.AimTo study familiarity with self-management skills for prevention of recurring UTI amongst adult women.Design And SettingsAn online questionnaire was developed, based on the UTI guideline and interviews with women having recurring UTI. Pharmacists in a postgraduate education programme (N = 76) aimed to invite 10 adult women with a recurring UTI prescription to complete the questionnaire. Women were asked for informed consent to link medication record data to questionnaire data.MethodWe calculated proportions of the scores for self-management skills and analysed differences between age groups with chi-square test.ResultsComplete questionnaires were available for 719 women (mean age 55.1 ± 18.5 years). The proportions of women 18-50 years and women 51 years or older were 36.4% and 63.6%, respectively. Education levels of women 18-50 years were significantly higher than those of women 51 years and older. Before consulting a general practitioner (GP) for symptoms, 32.1% of all women increased fluid intake; additionally, 15.0% used analgesics and increased fluid intake. Of all women, 33.9% searched internet for information on self-management and 18% occasionally received a prescription for patient-initiated treatment, half of these prescriptions for use during vacation. Cranberry was used by 47%, d-mannose by 5% and vitamin C by 29% of all women. Awareness of different preventive behavioural measures (eg, fluid intake, washing without soap and emptying bladder after sexual intercourse) varied between 20% and 90%.ConclusionAlmost half of all women applied self-management (increased fluid intake, analgesics) before consulting a GP for recurring UTI. Awareness of preventive behavioural measures for recurring UTI varied considerably. Thus, education of women about the use of analgesics and behavioural measures deserves attention.© 2021 The Authors. International Journal of Clinical Practice published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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