Sleep of primary enuretic children and controls

Abstract

Study objectives: To look for differences between the sleep of enuretic children and controls.

Design: In addition to standard polysomnographic features, body movement data and nocturnal micturitions were recorded.

Setting: The children's homes.

Participants: Twenty-one children with primary nocturnal enuresis and 6 controls of similar age.

Interventions: None.

Results: Sleep of the enuretic children did not diverge to a large extent from that of the controls. The only significant differences were that the enuretic children spent a slightly longer time in bed and had an increased number of sleep cycles. Although there was a trend for an increased number of short movements in enuretics, this was not statistically significant. Fifteen children experienced enuresis during the recording night. Micturition occurred during the first half of the night for most of the children and was not linked to any specific sleep stage. Children who voided during rapid-eye movemnt (REM) sleep were found to have more REM sleep than the others. Tachycardia was often seen to precede the enuretic event. In some subjects a short EEG arousal was observed before micturition.

Conclusions: Sleep of enuretic children is polysomnographically normal, but the children exhibit signs of autonomous arousal prior to micturition.