Study: Constipation Can Delay Toilet Training

Children who resist toilet training tend to have more difficult temperaments, but constipation may be the source of the problem and treatment could ease the transition, researchers said Monday.

Children who resist toilet training tend to have more difficult temperaments, but constipation may be the source of the problem and treatment could ease the transition, researchers said Monday. In a pair of studies published in the journal Pediatrics, several factors were seen as contributing to delayed toilet training, which children typically transition into by age 3. A comparison of children who had difficulty toilet training and children who had made the transition easily found the former tended to be less adaptable, prone to negative moods, and were less persistent, said pediatricians at Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston. Lax or strict parenting was not found to be a factor. One study found that more than half of both groups of children were constipated, but that hard, painful stools were more common among those who had trouble toilet training. But it was unclear if constipation caused the difficult toilet training. A second study found that constipation often preceded the difficult toilet training. “Earlier and more effective treatment of constipation may be a potential treatment option for decreasing the incidence and duration of stool toileting refusal,” wrote study author Nathan Blum of Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. A key indication that a child who avoids toilet training does have bowel control is that the child hides or demands a pull-up diaper when he or she needs to void, the report said. (Source: Reuters Health, June 2004)