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Home | Adult Bedwetting | Bedwetting Child | Bedwetting Diaper | Bedwetting Solution | Bedwetting Cure |
bedwetting in children, let the bedwetting child join summer camp, tips on dealing with bedwetting |
Bedwetting in childrenSummary: A parent's guide to understanding bedwetting in children and adolescents, and how to find help. Text: Bedwetting in children Bedwetting is common in children, and can affect adolescents too. It affects twice as many boys as girls, and can cause embarrassment and stress for children and their families. But help is available. What causes bedwetting? It's still uncertain but, according to the Continence Foundation of Australia, bedwetting isn't caused by deep sleep, laziness or emotional disturbances. Some experts believe that the ability to control the bladder may take longer to develop in some children. It is rare for bedwetting to be caused by a medical problem. There is often a family history of bedwetting. How do children develop bladder control? Bladder control isn't something we're born with - in babies the bladder automatically empties when it's full. But with time, children gradually learn to recognise when their bladder feels full and to control it. Most children are 'dry' during the day by the age of three and most are 'dry' at night by school age. However it's considered normal for children to occasionally be wet at night (and in the daytime) until they're about five. More info about children bedwetting. |
Summer Camp or BustYour Bedwetting Child Can Do It!
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An estimated five to seven million children in the United States wet their beds, according to the
National Kidney Foundation. And many of them successfully make the trip to overnight camp every year.
The behavior is so common that most camps think nothing of it and are prepared to handle it as discreetly as possible. “Each year during each session we always have kids that wet the bed,” says Greg Huff, summer camp program director for the Flatrock River YMCA Summer Camp in St. Paul, Ind. “Homesickness and bedwetting are things that all camps deal with.”
Bedwetting is a frequent behavior in children after they are toilet trained, but oftentimes children continue to wet the bed after the age of 6 or 7. This happens for a variety of reasons and the National Kidney Foundation recommends that you talk with your pediatrician if it continues. Some children don’t wake up when their bladder is full, some produce more urine while sleeping than others and some children’s bladders simply do not hold as much urine. Occasionally, stress such as a new baby in the family or a new school also can cause bedwetting.
If you want to send your child to overnight camp, Dr. Gregory Dean, director of pediatric urology at Temple Children’s Medical Center, recommends you begin preparing several months in advance. “I would recommend that parents address the issue of bedwetting in the months before camp season,” he says.
He suggests trying to eliminate the problem before kids head off to camp. First, he says to try limiting the amount of liquid your child drinks at night and encouraging them to use the bathroom before bedtime.
If your child continues to wet the bed there are other options that may help, such as a moisture alarm. The alarm sounds as soon as it detects the first bit of moisture, helping your child learn to feel when his bladder is full and when he is about to wet the bed. The National Kidney Foundation says moisture alarms have the highest long-term success rate.
Huff suggests that you talk with your child about camp before he heads off. “What concerns do they have going into this?” he says. You can allay any fears such as spiders or the dark, which may exacerbate the problem because they're afraid to walk to the bathroom.
To make your child’s camp experience as successful as possible, most camp directors prefer that you let them know about bedwetters ahead of time. “If the staff are armed and know about it ahead of time, they can be more proactive in helping,” says Huff. He suggests including it on the camper information form that you fill out before camp or discreetly handing your child’s counselor a note when you drop him off. He also asks that you include any instructions that may help such as limiting fluid intake before bed. Some camps ask that you send disposable absorbent undergarments to wear at night.
The content of above sources from Perschoolers Today.
Bedwetting in children
Bedwetting is common in children, and can affect adolescents too. It affects twice as many boys as girls, and can cause embarrassment and stress for children and their families. But help is available.
Causes of child bedwetting
Some experts believe that the ability to control the bladder may take longer to develop in some children. It is rare for bedwetting to be caused by a medical problem. There is often a family history of bedwetting.
How can children develop bladder control?
Bladder control isn't something we're born with - in babies the bladder automatically empties when it's full. But with time, children gradually learn to recognize when their bladder feels full and to control it. Most children are 'dry' during the day by the age of three and most are 'dry' at night by school age. However it's considered normal for children to occasionally be wet at night (and in the daytime) until they're about five.
When to seek help ?
The general advice is to get professional help when:
Find more info if you are interesting in above content.
The medical name for bedwetting is Enuresis, which means 'the involuntary
voiding of urine beyond the age of anticipated control'. This is a common
condition prevalent in children. While most children are toilet trained
by the time they are three to four years old, wetting the bed at night
is still a familiar problem for many six to eight year old children. Statistics
show that it affects about 8% of eight year olds. It is more common in
boys and in families in which one or both parents wet the bed as a child.
Bedwetting is defined into two categories, primary in which children who have never had dry nights, and secondary where children who have recently started wetting the bed, but who had previously been dry for 3-6 months.
Some of the common reasons why a child wets bed at night are:
Most young children get embarrassed by their condition and tend to withdraw and feel isolated. They do not participate in social activities that require them to sleep outside their home, like overnight picnics or sleeping over at a friend's place. Children often suffer from low self-image. Parents may also feel frustrated, embarrassed and annoyed at their children's bedwetting problem. Their attitude might have an adverse effect on the children. As a parent, you can help your child reduce negative feelings about his/her bed-wetting condition and speed up the process of overcoming it, by offering positive support, understanding and encouragement.
Please visit Free Kid Crafts to find more info about Bed Wetting.
Antique Way Investment Service Banking Service By Mortgage Child Healths Man Healths Autos Home
by
Diane K. Newman, RNC, MSN, CRNP, FAAN Overview & Prevalence
Bedwetting (voiding while
asleep) is a condition that affects 5-7 million children over the age
of six. Often parents are too uncomfortable or embarrassed to discuss
their child's bedwetting as they feel it may reflect on them as
a parent. Also, children are ashamed or embarrassed by the problem and
are fearful that friends will learn about it. Children who wet the bed
rank bedwetting as the third most stressful life event after parents'
divorce and fighting. It is important for parents and children to understand
that bedwetting resolves at a rate of 15 percent per year, so most children
will outgrow it.
Statistics show that twenty percent of four-year-olds still wet the bed, but ten to fifteen percent of these children stop bed-wetting each year and as many as one to three percent of eighteen-year-olds still wet their bed. Studies show a strong family history of bed-wetting is predictive and risk increases five to seven times for a child with one parent that experienced bed-wetting in childhood.
Bedwetting (referred to as nocturnal enuresis) is defined as the involuntary passage of urine in a child age five or older in the absence of other medical conditions such as congenital defects or conditions of the nervous (brain and spinal cord) and urinary tract systems (kidneys & bladder). Ten percent of all children over age four, mostly boys, experience bedwetting, which is the most common bladder disorder seen in young people. In addition, approximately 750,000 children with such handicaps and birth defects as spina bifida or tethered cord syndrome experience ongoing bladder control problems. At least one percent of school children may have abnormal voiding habits and all forms of childhood wetting, other than bedwetting, should be categorized as bladder incontinence.
Only five to ten percent of children who suffer from enuresis are found to have a physical abnormality. Only one to three percent of adolescents over age sixteen are troubled by nocturnal enuresis. Controversy surrounds the various treatment options and most health care professionals (doctors and nurses) feel that parents should postpone medical action, at least until puberty, since most children outgrow the problem by then.
The above info quoted from Seek Wellness.
By LAURAN NEERGAARD
AP Medical Writer
August 29, 2005, 9:18 PM EDT
WASHINGTON -- To help a 7-year-old overcome bedwetting, Dr. Howard Bennett reaches for red water balloons and a superhero named Bladderman. Bedwetting is a problem for more than 5 million U.S. children age 6 or older.
Alarms and medicines are available, but understanding how their bodies work for many kids is key to staying dry -- instruction that's a challenge to work into the typical rushed visit to the pediatrician.
Enter Bladderman, Bennett's creation and hero of the first book published by the American Academy of Pediatrics that's aimed directly at children, not just their parents.
The goal: To demystify bedwetting so that children understand accidents aren't their fault -- it's not a matter of willpower but of biology -- and to outline research-backed steps they can take to help stay dry.
Bedwetting "is common. You can ask for help," says Bennett, author of "Waking Up Dry" and a Washington pediatrician who specializes in treating what doctors call nocturnal enuresis.
Bedwetting is hard on youngsters' self-esteem. They may decline sleepovers or dread camp, or devise elaborate schemes, such as doing their own laundry, to hide the problem. Bennett even had a 9-year-old patient whose younger brother discovered his bedwetting and used it as blackmail.
Children usually get nighttime bladder control between ages 3 and 5. The brain and bladder must learn to work together: First, the bladder signals the brain that it's filling. The brain then either signals back for the bladder to relax and hold more urine overnight, or signals the child to awaken.
Occasionally, medical problems such as diabetes or anatomical abnormalities, cause bedwetting. But 85 percent of the time, it happens simply because the brain-bladder maturation isn't finished. Three main reasons:
* While people's bladders are all about the same size, some sense that it's full sooner than it really is. Bennett calls this a "small functional bladder."
* Some kids don't produce enough of a hormone called vasopressin that signals the kidneys to make less urine at night.
* Some children are difficult to arouse at night, and sleep through the tickle sensations of a full bladder.
Boys are twice as likely as girls to experience delays in nighttime bladder control, and bedwetting tends to run in families; whatever age mom or dad became dry usually is the age their own children will.
The good news: Fifteen percent of bedwetters become dry each year without any intervention.
For children who don't want to wait it out, there are ways to help. Most common are alarms that buzz or vibrate when they sense wetness. Studies show the alarms, which cost from $60 to $200, can help train children to wake up.
"But the education is crucial," stresses Dr. Patrick McKenna, chairman of urology at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, citing studies that show good training in how the bladder works and how to control it can meet or exceed the devices' effect.
It requires an hour of doctor-child training, hard to squeeze into a busy pediatrician's schedule, McKenna says.
So parents often are left seeking more information on their own, from such sources as the National Kidney Foundation -- which has some kid-friendly advice on its Internet site -- and the pediatrics' academy.
Humor, Bennett says, eases kids' anxiety so they can learn: He regularly gets splashed as he uses water balloons to show his patients how the bladder's door, the sphincter muscle, controls urination.
Among his recommendations:
* Exercise that muscle by squeezing it several times a day.
* Limit liquid near bedtime, but drink two extra glasses of water earlier in the day to exercise your bladder. "We think if you pay attention to your bladder in the daytime, you'll pay more attention at night," Bennett explains.
* Kids should chart on a calendar how often they wet. Once they're dry for 14 consecutive nights, bedwetting likely is over.
* Tell kids it takes practice to achieve bladder control, just like sports stars practice their jobs daily -- and offer small weekly rewards for the effort whether they stay dry or not, advice that mothers of two of Bennett's patients called key to maintaining children's enthusiasm.
There are bedwetting medications, including a synthetic version of vasopressin to reduce urine production. But Bennett and other specialists stress they should be a last resort; they have side effects and their effect is almost always temporary.
When pediatrician-based programs fail, urology specialists typically are called -- but even with many hard-to-treat cases, bladder training without medication can help, says McKenna, who developed computer games that help youngsters exercise their pelvic muscles. Lauran Neergaard covers health and medical issues for The Associated Press in Washington.
More info about Education Could Be Key to Stop Bedwetting.
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A more common issue than most parents imagine, bedwetting amongst school-age
children can lead to great anxiety for the whole family.
On average, children are dry at night by around age four or five. If, however, your school-age child is still not dry at night, s/he's in good company: plenty of children simply take longer to achieve this particular milestone than others.
The speed at which children achieve night-time dryness varies, often starting with one or two dry nights a week and building up slowly over a number of months, the Education and Resources for Improving Childhood Continence (ERIC) helpline says.
It is not always easy to pinpoint the reason why some children acquire night-time control later than others, but it is not because of laziness or lack of willpower; it can be a genetic problem. The key is to remain as positive as you can, and to treat the issue consistently.
There are plenty of things you can do to make your lives easier until your child eventually grows out of bedwetting, and it helps to understand why the situation occurs in the first place.
Bedwetting (also known as nocturnal enuresis) is more common than many parents think, affecting around one in seven children aged five and one in 20 children aged ten. Without any treatment, the problem usually resolves itself gradually over a number of years, with less wet nights each year. Most children who are still wetting at age 10 have never had a dry night; a few may have regressed after weeks or months of being dry.
Some children simply have a smaller bladder capacity than others, and this - combined with last-minute pre-bedtime drinks - can result in bedwetting accidents. About one child in seven who has the problem will also have a sibling or parent who was late to become dry at night. The bladder may also be "overactive", giving an urgent signal to empty before it is full.
To increase bladder capacity and encourage good function, ensure that your child has 6-8 glasses of water or water-based drinks throughout the day. However, during the last couple of hours before bedtime, limit drinks to water or diluted juice only, as there are certain ingredients in other drinks that may exacerbate the problem. Encourage your child to empty his bladder just before you tuck him in.
It is believed that the production of a hormone that inhibits the amount of urine made throughout the night is greater in some children than others. Those children who don't produce as much of this hormone, known as vasopressin, will make more urine and be more prone to bedwetting - especially as they may also be less aware of having a full bladder than others.
This problem usually resolves itself as children mature. Again, it's wise to limit drinks close to bedtime, and make sure that your child visits the loo just before sleeping.
Some food and drinks contain caffeine, which is a known diuretic (encouraging the production of urine). These include chocolate and caffeinated cola.
Avoid giving your child anything containing caffeine within an hour of bedtime. You can buy decaffeinated cola, which is a better choice health wise anyway.
If your child is constipated, this can have a knock-on effect on the sensitivity of his bladder, as any obstruction in the rectum can 'irritate' the bladder.
Prevent or ease constipation by increasing the amount of roughage in your child's diet. This includes unpeeled fruit and vegetables and wholemeal or wholegrain foods, such as brown rice, wholegrain bread and whole-wheat pasta. Encourage your child to drink more fluids during the daytime - but decrease the amount you offer him towards bedtime.
You may want to seek professional help from your doctor if your child is aged six or seven or above. The doctor will be able to make a full assessment and advise on treatment options. Meanwhile, there are ways of making life easier all round whilst your child's bladder matures sufficiently for him to stay dry at night.
Taking your child out of bed a couple of hours after he has fallen asleep (known as 'lifting') is one way of preventing wetting, but whether it works for you and your child or not will depend largely on his response to being woken: some children will stagger to the loo half-asleep, but others will protest loudly and have their sleep badly disrupted. Lifting is most effective in children who have started to have the occasional dry night, as they are already beginning to awaken when the bladder is full. ERIC advises that if parents choose to try lifting, they should vary the time each night and ensure that their child is fully awake.
Bedwetting alarms are usually used only from age seven. These consist of a sensor pad worn on the pants or placed under the bed sheet, and an alarm that goes off when the bed is wet. It is important that both parent and child respond to the alarm, rather than leaving the child to cope alone. Most children who wet the bed appear to sleep deeply, but it has less to do with the depth of sleep and more to do with the ability to arouse from sleep to go to the toilet or to hold on until morning. The alarm helps this process; in fact, research has shown that enuresis alarms have been proven to be the most effective form of treatment, with a success rate of around 80 per cent, but they do need commitment and perseverance from both child and parents. On average, treatment will take about three months.
An anti-diuretic drug, known as Desmopressin, is sometimes prescribed for children who wet the bed. This is taken last thing before bed and works by suppressing the amount of urine produced overnight. It can be taken as a nasal spray or orally and works well in most children, although not all.
The majority will have a brief relapse when treatment is stopped. It may be worth asking your GP about using this treatment as a stop-gap whilst your child's bladder matures. It can be particularly useful for sleepovers or trips away from home.
You will need your child's cooperation to overcome bedwetting, and some parents find that a reward scheme helps. It is important to reward positive actions that your child takes, such as drinking frequently throughout the day, helping to change the bed or taking responsibility for going to the loo last thing at night. Rewarding a child only for a dry night can be demoralising.
It is important to remain low-key about the situation, and not to humiliate or pressurise your child. This is where the emotional link comes in: a child who is ridiculed or punished for wetting the bed will feel inadequate and may suffer socially, too. This is demotivating, when what your child really needs is motivation to get up to go to the loo.
Make it easier for your child to find his way to the toilet in the night by leaving a light on for him: he may have unspoken fears of the dark that are preventing him from getting up.
It is practical and sensible to invest in a waterproof mattress protector and a good supply of extra bedding to make midnight bed-changing easier. Also, temporary measures such as night-time absorbent pants can help ease the situation for both you and your child. (More info about Dry nights.)
