Overactive bladder (OAB) is a general term for various urinary symptoms. The most common symptom is a sudden urge to urinate that cannot be controlled. Other symptoms include leaking urine, frequent urination, and waking up at night to urinate.

OAB is a common condition that affects up to 40% of women and 30% of men in the United States. It can usually be controlled with lifestyle changes, prescription medications, botulinum toxin (Botox) treatments, nerve stimulation, and, in severe cases, surgery.

Whether you have already been diagnosed with OAB or suspect you have it, you may want to consider keeping a bladder diary. This can give you clues about what’s behind your OAB symptoms and even help you manage them.

“The bottom line is that they are very easy to do,” says Dr. Howard Goldman, a urologist at the Cleveland Clinic. “They cost nothing, pose no risk, and many of the guidelines on how to treat overactive bladder suggest that keeping a diary before starting treatment can be very helpful.”

There are several reasons why you may want to start a bladder diary.

To collect data for yourself: “If you think something might be going on, keeping a bladder diary could be very helpful to see how often you actually go to the bathroom and when you’re leaking urine,” says Dr. Margaret Mueller, a urogynecologist at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago.

That said, Mueller notes that women in particular tend to think they urinate too frequently because “their bladder interferes with their ability to do 100 million things in a day.” In reality, she says they are often within the normal range. A bladder diary can prove this and give you peace of mind.

To take to your healthcare provider: If you decide to see your healthcare provider about your symptoms, it is helpful to keep a bladder diary. For example, keeping track of how much you urinate can give your provider a much better idea of ​​how much your bladder can hold and how long you go to the bathroom. “We have patients who think they go all the time, but you look at their diary and they only go five times,” says Goldman. “It’s a big difference if someone only has 6 ounces in their bladder versus 15 ounces.”

To identify behaviors you can change: You may have bothersome symptoms, such as having to go to the bathroom too often or having to run to get there on time. Goldman says a bladder diary can show you some behaviors you can change on your own before you even go to the doctor.

For example, you may notice that you drink a lot right before bed or that you consume more Diet Cokes a day than you thought. “Sometimes part of the problem with OAB is that someone may be drinking too much fluid or too much caffeine, which may be an underlying factor,” says Goldman.

When requested by your healthcare provider: Goldman asks his patients to keep a bladder diary when he sees them for the first time. “The most important thing from the beginning is to have an idea of ​​what is happening,” he says.

Both Mueller and Goldman also sometimes ask their patients to keep a bladder diary when starting a new treatment or to gauge their response to treatment. “There are some therapies that we can do a trial on. In those cases, we can keep a journal before and then during therapy to get an idea of ​​how much it is helping,” says Goldman.

When you get up several times during the night: A bladder diary is important for people who urinate frequently at night “because we can see if they’re urinating more at night than they should,” says Goldman. Typically, you should urinate less than a third of your total urine volume at night, she explains. If you urinate more than that, this could indicate other medical problems that are causing your body to produce more fluid at night.

One of the most common causes of excessive urination at night, known as nocturnal polyuria, is obstructive sleep apnea. “When you have obstructive sleep apnea, you produce less antidiuretic hormone because your body thinks it’s daytime and produces urine normally,” Mueller says. If someone has risk factors for sleep apnea, such as snoring, being overweight or obese, “we typically refer them for a sleep study to see if that might be part of the picture,” she says. “The benefit is that sleep apnea is reversible and getting treatment can really reduce bladder symptoms.”

Choose your tracking method. You can write your bladder diary in a notebook, download a template and print it (Goldman recommends This), or find an app for your phone. There are even companies that sell cups that measure urine and automatically upload the volume to an app, according to Goldman. “However, the average person probably doesn’t need to be that fancy,” she says.

Keep the diary for 3 days. One day is not enough because things can change too much from day to day, says Goldman. “There have been studies that show that a 3-day diary is not much different from longer diaries, so 3 days is short enough to get an idea of ​​what’s going on, but long enough to give you an idea. precise,” he explains.

Use 24 hour periods. Start tracking when you wake up in the morning. You don’t have to track for 3 days in a row, but you should do it 24 hours in a row. For example, if you wake up at 7 am on the first day, complete your schedule until 7 am the next day.

Measure your urine. You will need a cup unless you have a collection device from your healthcare provider. A measuring cup is a good option so you can see exactly how much you’ve gone through. You will need to rinse the cup or collection device with water after each use. Be sure to measure and track how much urine you pass both during the day and at night.

Use a bladder diary to track information and symptoms such as:

• How much fluid do you drink?
• How often do you drink?
• How often do you urinate?
• how much you urinate
• How often do you feel an urgent need to urinate?
• When and how much urine you lose, if any

Goldman emphasizes that it’s important to get everything checked by your healthcare provider if you have symptoms of OAB. “Now there’s everything from certain exercises to lots of medications to Botox injections and pacemakers,” he says. “We can do all kinds of things, so VH is not something people should have to live with.”