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Repeated Urges to Urinate At Night Might Indicate Sleep Apnea

by Julia Samuel on Mar 27 2017 5:08 PM
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Highlights

  • Nocturia affects more than half of men and women over the age of 50 and is reported as the most irritating of all voiding symptoms.
  • The prevalence of nocturia with among //patients with Obstructive Sleep Apnea is 69%.
  • Treatment with C-PAP, reduces nocturia in 65% of patients with 1 or more voiding episodes per night.
Obstructive sleep apnea or difficulty in breathing while asleep -often associated with loud snoring can make you wake up one time too many at night to urinate.
A new study has found that reducing obstructive sleep apnea can help reduce the need to get up and pee at night (nocturia). This study confirms the link between apnea and nocturia, and supports the idea that lifestyle management can contribute to reducing nocturia in certain cases.

Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSAS) affects between 2% and 4% of men and women over the age of 50. OSAS is caused by repetitive upper airway obstruction during sleep as a result of narrowing of the breathing passages. Obstruction is like strangulating a person repeatedly and depriving them of their constant oxygen supply to the body. 

Patients are treated by wearing a special mask while asleep - a CPAP mask (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure mask), which increases the air pressure in the throat .

C-PAP Reduces Nocturia

Research, presented at the European Association of Urology conference in London, shows that wearing the mask reduces the frequency of nighttime peeing.

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For the study, all patients who received a C-PAP mask for OSAS in 2015, were interviewed and invited to take part. Prior to treatment for apnea, 69% of these patients reported nocturia (the need to get up and pee more than once a night).

After starting to use the mask, nearly 2/3 of patients (65%) reported a reduction in the need to pee at night. The exact figure depended on the severity of the nocturia, with for example 32 of the 77 patients who previously reported 2 episodes per night, were able to pass the whole night undisturbed while to using the mask.

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The use of frequency volume charts would be the next step to pinpoint the exact amount of successful treatment of nocturia with C-PAP in OSAS.

This study is the first large study to show a clear relationship between treatment with C-PAP in patients with primary OSAS complaints and the reduction of their nocturia episodes, stratified by the number of voiding episodes per night.

Reference
  1. Degalliers, S. et al., Reduction of nocturia in patients treated with C-PAP for obstructive sleep apnea syndrome, The 32nd European Association of Urology conference (2017).


Source-Medindia


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