In a study of about more than 6,000 children researchers found that about seven out of 100 boys and three out of 100 girls wet their beds at least once a month.
Bedwetting is hereditary in four out of ten cases, said Dr. Joseph Barone, pediatric urologist at the Bristol-Myers Squibb Children's Hospital in New Brunswick, New Jersey.
Sometimes the link between the bladder and the brain isn't fully developed yet, he said, and more boys than girls tend to be bedwetters because girls mature faster. But by age 15, 99 per cent of kids outgrow it, Barone, who did not work on the Journal of Pediatrics study, told Reuters Health.
In most children, the best way to cure bedwetting is to use an alarm, Barone said. This is a sensor in a child's underwear, which goes off when it gets wet. It's connected to an alarm on a wristband or next to their head. If this doesn't work, there are also medications, Barone said, such as desmopressin acetate (known as DDAVP) or imipramine. However, these do have side effects, and they are a treatment, not a cure, he said.
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