Feet up at night: Simple strategy for reducing nocturia
What advice do you have for managing adults with complaints of nocturia?
What advice do you have for managing adults with complaints of nocturia?
About half of older patients with such complaints will have some element of nocturnal polyuria, responded Alan Wein, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.
"Behavioral modification is really important. Tell people, don?t drink anything after dinnertime, and make sure you void before you go to bed. If you wake up at night, make sure you empty your bladder when you get up. If you're on a diuretic, see if your doctor can give it to you in the late afternoon," Dr. Wein advised telling patients.
David Staskin, MD, of Weill Medical College of Cornell University, New York, recommended another lifestyle change.
"Tell patients, if you're lying on a couch or sitting in a chair, get your legs higher than your heart. It moves one of the voids from the night to the evening. Patients are not going to have any fewer voids, but the voids are going to happen in the daytime instead of the nighttime. It?s the first thing I say to patients," he said.
