Nocturia is more harmful to quality of life than daytime lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS), according to new study findings.
Physicians from France, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States diagnosed and assessed 8738 real-world patients with LUTS. More than 5000 of these patients also completed a symptom questionnaire. Patients specifically diagnosed with nocturia were significantly more bothered by their LUTS than patients with daytime symptoms only, Karel Everaert, MD, PhD, of Ghent University Hospital in Belgium, and colleagues reported in the International Journal of Clinical Practice. Men and women with nocturia were frequently tired, and just 13% had 2 or 3 hours of unbroken sleep before waking up to void. All who voided during the night reported difficulty falling back to sleep.
“The underlying causes of bother were related to sleep problems,” Dr Everaert stated. She highlighted inherent problems in incorporating nocturia within broad diagnoses of overactive bladder (OAB) and benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH): “It is essential that nocturia is understood, treated and monitored as a distinct problem from OAB and BPH, to ensure that patients are treated for their main symptom.”
Continue Reading
According to the authors, treatment efficacy should be measured by sleep improvement in addition to reduction in the number of voids.
Reference
Everaert K, Anderson P, Wood R, Andersson FL, and Holm-Larsen T. Nocturia is more bothersome than daytime LUTS: Results from an Observational, Real-life Practice Database including 8659 European and American LUTS patients. Intl J Clin Prac. DOI: 10.1111/ijcp.13091
