Adults with intellectual disability produced significantly lower and more variable pelvic floor muscle contractions than matched controls, even without current incontinence. After adjusting for age, sex, and body size, the difference remained, pointing to the disability itself as the factor.
The primary outcome — mean EMG activity during voluntary pelvic floor contraction — was significantly lower in the intellectual disability group than in the control group, with greater between-person variability in the ID group.
In a multiple regression adjusting for age, sex, and BMI, intellectual disability was the only variable significantly associated with lower mean pelvic floor activation; age, sex, and BMI were not.
No significant between-group differences were found in post-contraction signal reduction, resting signal variability, or relaxation time, suggesting the difference is concentrated in the active contraction phase rather than recovery.
Single-blind randomized controlled trial. Sixty-four participants were randomized across two intervention arms and assessed at twelve weeks for the primary outcome…
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