• Fatih Özden, İsmet Tümtürk, Mehmet Özkeskin, and Serkan Bakırhan.
• Department of Health Care Services, Köyceğiz Vocational School of Health Services, Muğla Sıtkı Koçman University, Muğla, Turkey. fatihozden@mu.edu.tr.
• Ir J Med Sci. 2023 Jun 1; 192 (3): 148114951481-1495.

BackgroundNo other systematic review presented the effectiveness of pelvic floor muscle training (PFMT) in individual with stroke.AimsThe purpose of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to demonstrate the effectiveness of PFMT for urinary incontinence in patients with stroke.Methods"Web of Science (WoS), Cochrane Library, PubMed and Scopus" databases were searched. "Revised Cochrane risk-of-bias tool randomized trials (RoB 2)" and "PEDro" were used to assess the risk of bias and methodological quality of the studies. Narrative synthesis and meta-analysis were conducted to present the results.ResultsA total of 8 articles were included in the review. Seven articles were classified as "good" level evidence. Four articles were considered to have "high risk" of bias for the overall score. Regarding two homogenous studies, PFMT-based rehabilitation was not superior standard urinary incontinence therapy on SF-36-Social Function score at 12-week follow-up (ES 0.47, 95% CI - 0.16-0.96). Data pooling of two studies did not provide an additional advantage of pelvic muscle training on 3 days voiding diary (night, total day) score at 12-week follow-up (ES 28, 95% CI - 0.61-0.48; ES 0.30, 95% CI - 0.23-0.95). On the other hand, low-quality evidence demonstrated that pelvic muscle training yielded better results on daytime voiding (ES 0.28, 95% CI 0.04-1.16).ConclusionsThe results demonstrated that PFMT had positive effects in terms of daytime urination frequency and incontinence. Although some studies have reported positive effects on symptoms, function, strength, and endurance, the generalizability of these results is controversial. Further studies should assess the quality-of-life and function with urinary incontinence and stroke-specific tools.© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland.

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