620 Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service in 2012, there are 2 tertiary hospitals, 19 secondary hospitals, 69 primary hospitals, and 29 nursing hospitals in Gwangju. The number of urologists in those institutions are 9 in ter- tiary hospitals, 13 in secondary hospitals, 1 in primary hos- pitals, and 0 in nursing hospitals. If tertiary hospitals are excluded, 14 urologists are managing inpatients referred by doctors in other departments [6]. In particular, patients in nursing hospitals in this area may have difficulties in urologic treatment and management because of the ab- sence of urologists, although these hospitals are presumed to have many patients with urologic problems considering the characteristics of the inpatients [7]. Accordingly, we aimed to determine the necessity of professional treatment and the role of urologists in treating inpatients by analyz- ing the cooperative behavior patients referred to the de- partment of urology. MATERIALS AND METHODS The sex, age, referring department, and disease group of the inpatients referred to the department of urology from January 1, 2009, to December 31, 2011, were extracted from the patients’ medical records regardless of current or past medical history of urologic disease. The patients were divided into 10 subgroups by age and into disease groups as follows: urination disorder, infection, tumor, calculus, trauma, pediatrics, andrology, and others. The urination disorder group included neurogenic bladder, benign pro- static hypertrophy, urinary retention, urinary incon- tinence, and overactive bladder. The neurogenic bladder patients included patients with suspected neurogenic bladder, those with congenital or acquired disease that could induce neurogenic disorder, those with a past medi- cal history of pelvic surgery such as radical hysterectomy or radical colectomy, and those who were diagnosed as hav- ing neurogenic bladder. Patients with urinary retention were defined as those who had difficulties in self-voiding Lee et al despite enough volume of urine in the bladder or who had considerable remaining urine in the bladder in the residual urine test. Overactive bladder patients who complained of urge urinary incontinence were placed in the urinary in- continence group. For infection, not only pyuria simplex but also prostatitis was included. For tumor, not only the patients with confirmed urogenital tract tumors but also cases acquiring hematuria and those with an abnormal prostate-specific antigen level were included. In the pedia- tric group, all patients under 10 years of age regardless of disease were classified as pediatrics. The “others” group in- cluded cystoscope test commission to identify the patho- genesis of other departmental carcinomas, installation and removal of ureteral stents, and inquiries for urologic radiology tests. RESULTS 1. Sex distribution The total number of referrals to the department of urology in our hospital was 3,261, or 1,787 males (54.79%) and 1,474 females (45.20%) by sex, showing that more male pa- tients than female patients were referred to urology (Fig. 1). This distribution was similar yearly for the 3-year peri- od examined. 2. Age distribution Concerning the distribution of the patients by age, there were 39 patients aged 0 to 9 years (1.19%), 7 patients aged 10 to 19 years (0.21%), 15 patients aged 20 to 29 years (0.45%), 213 patients aged 30 to 39 years (6.53%), 250 pa- tients aged 40 to 49 years (7.66%), 416 patients aged 50 to 59 years (12.75%), 876 patients aged 60 to 69 years (25.94%), 1076 patients aged 70 to 79 years (32.72%), 368 patients aged 80 to 89 years (11.28%), and 10 patients aged 90 years or older (0.30%). A total of 2321 (71.17%) patients were 60 years or older, and the largest population age slot was patients in their 70s (Fig. 2). FIG. 1. Distribution of the sex of the patients referred to the department of urology over 3 years (n=3,261). FIG. 2. Distribution of the ages of the patients referred to the department of urology over 3 years. Korean J Urol 2012;53:619-624