7- or 30-day recall questions accurately capture self-reported LUTS

Seven- and 30-day recalled reports correspond well with averaged daily reports by men and women with lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS), a recent study has shown.

“Systematic bias was minimal, suggesting that 7- and 30-day recall periods for self-reported LUTS are reasonable,” the investigators said.

This study recruited a total of 261 female and 254 male participants from six US tertiary care sites. Eighteen items representing seven symptoms, which include voiding and postmicturition symptoms, were evaluated.

Item responses on the daily forms were then averaged for a 7- or a 30-day period and compared to the corresponding 7-or 30-day recall version of the item. Analyses were item- and gender-specific.

Pearson correlation was used to evaluate within-person concordance. Bias (systematic over-reporting or under-reporting) was calculated as the difference between the recalled item and the averaged daily item score and was reported as a percent of the item scale.

All correlations were above 0.60, with those between averaged daily reports and recalled reports ranging from 0.72 to 0.89 for 7 days and from 0.71 to 0.09 for 30 days among women, and from 0.68 to 0.90 and 0.68 to 0.95, respectively, among men.

Moreover, systematic bias was not observed in most items, and the median percent bias did not exceed 10 percent for any item. However, a subset of individuals was found to have bias exceeding ±10 percent for some items.

“Self-reported measurement tools often provide a recall period (eg, “In the past 7 days…”),” the investigators noted.