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ADHD and Bedwetting
Advice and Treatment Options for Parents
By Debora Geary
"I have always known my son was different: three handfuls, not just one," says Sylvia, an Oberlin, Pa., mom of a 10-year-old boy. He was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) at 6 and has experienced bedwetting ever since he was in diapers.
Sylvia is not alone in facing these two challenges together. Parents, clinicians and researchers have all noticed a tendency for ADHD and bedwetting to occur in the same children. A research study published in the Southern Medical Journal in 1997 found that at age 6, ADHD children were nearly three times more likely than other children to have nighttime bedwetting and almost five times more likely to have daytime wetting episodes.
Despite the clear tendency of ADHD and bedwetting to occur together, doctors and medical researchers have not been able to find a definitive link between the two, says Dr. Joseph Biederman, a pediatric psychopharmacologist at Harvard University. The big question is: Does ADHD cause bedwetting, does bedwetting cause ADHD, or does something else cause both?
"It is possible that enuresis (bedwetting) is more common in children with ADHD, because children with ADHD are distractible and do not pay attention to the signals of the need to void," says Dr. Lane Robson, a specialist in pediatric urology at the University of Oklahoma. "If this were true, then ADHD might be considered a potential cause of enuresis." In other words, bedwetting is just one of the things that can happen as a result of ADHD behaviors.
Want to see more?
- Attention Deficit Disorder: How It Affects the Family
- Understanding Attention Deficit Disorder
- What's Wrong With My Child? An Overview of Attention Deficit Disorder
- Bedwetting and Special Needs Kids
- Bedwetting and Developmental Delays: How the Urinary System Works in Kids
- Under Special Circumstances: Sleep Disorders and Bedwetting in Special Needs Children
- Talk about it!