International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS)

Assess severity of symptoms in benign prostatic hypertrophy

About

The International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS) can be utilized to measure the severity of lower urinary tract symptoms.

It is a validated, reproducible scoring system to assess disease severity and response to therapy.

The IPSS is made up of 7 questions related to voiding symptoms. A score of 0 to 7 indicates mild symptoms, 8 to 19 indicates moderate symptoms and 20 to 35 indicates severe symptoms.

It is not a reliable diagnostic tool for lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) suggestive of BPH, but can be used to quantitatively measure LUTS after a diagnosis is made.

The IPSS isn't adequate for ruling in or ruling out the diagnosis of bladder outlet obstruction. In the JAMA Rational Clinical Exam paper by D'Silva et al, a cut-off of ≥20 increased the likelihood of bladder outlet obstruction (positive LR, 1.5; 95% CI, 1.1-2.0), whereas scores of less than 20 had an LR that included 1.0 in the 95% CI (negative LR, 0.82; 95% CI, 0.67-1.00).

References

D'Silva KA, Dahm P, Wong CL.

JAMA: the Journal of the American Medical Association 2014 August 6, 312 (5): 535-42

The International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS) calculator is created by QxMD.

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1. Incomplete Emptying

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