Clinical characteristics, risk factors and diagnostic methods of urinary tract infection: A literature review

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Urinary tract infection is the infection with the highest incidence per year. The frequency of its occurrence depends on gender and age, while the clinical situation of patients varies.

Aim: To present the clinical features, risk factors and diagnostic methods of urinary tract infection in children aged from 3 months to 5 years, as well as in adult males and females.

Materials and Methodology: A literature review of studies published in English language, from 01/01/2008 to 30/05/2019 in PubMed and Scopus databases was conducted, with the following key-words: “UTI”, “urinary tract infection”, “diagnostic method*”, “woman”, “man”, “children”, “dipstick”, “detection”, “home test” and “detection devices”. Exclusion criteria were animal studies, language expect for English and type of article (letter to publisher, editorial article and case study).

Results: Of all published studies, 28 met the inclusion criteria. The results showed that the clinical characteristics and risk factors depend on the patient's gender, age and clinical situation. Typical diagnostic methods are dipstick tests, urine culture and microscopy. Additional methods are flow cytometry, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and in situ hybridization fluorescence.

Conclusions: Urinary tract infection is a worldwide problem on a yearly basis and should be promptly and correctly diagnosed in order to avoid unnecessary use of antibiotics.

Keywords: Urinary tract infection, diagnostic, methods, clinical characteristics, risk factors