Epidemiology of Interstitial Cystitis/Painful Bladder

间质性膀胱炎（IC）的特点是慢性和衰弱性膀胱疼痛，通常伴有尿频和尿急。由于缺乏明确且被广泛接受的病例定义，研究一直受到阻碍，因此人们对1C在人群中的患病率、IC患者的全部疾病负担、他们寻求的护理类型以及他们接受的治疗类型知之甚少。目前尚无标准化的问卷用于患者筛查或流行病学研究。由于缺乏有关IC的信息，很难满足患者对医疗和非医疗护理的需求。因此，在拟议的研究中，我们将建立(1)女性IC的病例定义，用于患者筛查或流行病学研究，使用IC和具有类似症状的疾病的德尔菲专家小组；(2)制定并验证一份症状问卷，用于识别和区分女性IC患者

Interstitial cystitis (IC) is characterized by chronic and debilitating bladder pain, usually accompanied by urinary frequency and urgency. Because research has been hampered by the lack of a clear and well accepted case definition, little is known about the prevalence of 1C in the population, the full burden of disease for IC patients, the kinds of care they seek, and the kinds of treatment they receive. At present, there is no standardized questionnaire for patient screening or epidemiological studies. The lack of information about IC makes it difficult to meet patients' needs for medical and non-medical care. In the proposed research, therefore, we will establish (1) a case definition of IC in women for patient screening or epidemiological studies using a Delphi panel of experts in IC and diseases with similar symptoms; (2) develop and validate a symptom questionnaire that can be used to identify female IC patients and distinguish them from those with similar conditions (e.g., overactive bladder, urinary tract infection, and endometriosis); (3) develop an IC-specific measure of self-reported functional status, including physical, mental, social, sexual/relationship, role functioning and other factors identified by IC patients as important; (4) survey more than 300,000 women for urinary symptoms and, using the validated symptom questionnaire, screen more than 23,000 to estimate prevalence of IC in the United States and provide a sample of 354 women over age 18 who fit the case definition for IC and 300 who have IC-like symptoms; (5) describe the impact of IC on patient's lives, including IC-specific functional status and the impact of IC on quality of life, mental and physical health, stress and coping, social support, sexual functioning, social functioning, labor force participation and income, as well as utilization of traditional and alternative care and compare these results with existing data on disease burden for other chronic diseases.