Aim: To identify risk factors for urinary tract infection (UTI) in children to inform the development of preventative strategies.
Method: A validated questionnaire covering demographic factors, perinatal, developmental, bowel and urinary history was sent to a cross-sectional sample of parents of elementary school children randomly selected from the first 4 years of school. UTI was ascertained by parental report, verified by cross-referencing with microbiological reports for all positive cases and 50 randomly selected negative cases.
Results: Parents of 2856 children (mean age 7.3 years, range 4.8-12.8 years) responded. A total of 3.6% of children had a bacteriologically verified UTI, compared with 12.6% by parental report alone. Multivariate polychotomous logistic regression showed that a history of structural kidney abnormalities (odds ratio (OR) 15.7, 95% confidence interval 8.1-30.4), daytime incontinence (OR 2.6, 1.6-4.5), female gender (OR 2.4, 1.5-3.8), and encopresis (OR 1.9, 1.1-3.4) were independently associated with UTI. Daytime incontinence increased risk more in boys (8.3% vs. 1.2%) than girls (8.1% vs. 4.6%), and kidney problems increased risk in older compared with younger children (29% vs. 2% in > or =8 year olds, 0% vs. 4% in 4-6 year olds).
Conclusions: Parents over-report UTI by about threefold. Effective treatment of daytime urinary incontinence and encopresis may prevent UTI in children, especially boys.