Central Diabetes Insipidus: How to Care for Your Child

In central diabetes insipidus, a child's kidneys make a large amount of clear urine (pee). This happens because the body doesn't make enough of a hormone called anti-diuretic hormone (ADH). ADH helps the kidneys balance the amount of water and salt in the body. Children with central diabetes insipidus lose too much water in their pee. So they usually drink large amounts of liquids, get up in the night to drink or pee, wet the bed, or get dehydrated.

Most children with central diabetes insipidus take medicines to replace the missing hormone and help the body make normal amounts of urine. The medicine can be given as a pill, nasal spray, or injection (shot). If another problem is causing the central diabetes insipidus, health care providers will treat that problem if they can.

• Give your child any prescribed medicines as directed.

• Let your child drink whenever thirsty.

• Follow your health care provider's advice about what your child should eat.

• For babies, you may need to add water to formula or breast milk. You also may need to feed your baby more often. 

• Keep all appointments with your child's health care provider.

Your child:

• is cranky and hard to comfort

• has low energy and is more tired than usual

• is vomiting (throwing up)

Your child:

• has a seizure

• is extremely sleepy or hard to wake up

• has a severe headache

• is confused

• appears dehydrated; signs include dizziness, drowsiness, a dry or sticky mouth, sunken eyes (or sunken soft spot on an infant's head), crying with little or no tears

How does central diabetes insipidus happen? Central diabetes insipidus can happen when the hypothalamus or pituitary gland (glands in the brain) are damaged during brain surgery, from a head injury, or when someone has a tumor. When health care providers think a child might have central diabetes insipidus, they do blood tests and urine tests to confirm it. Some kids also might need other tests, like magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the head, to look for the cause of central diabetes insipidus.

Is central diabetes insipidus the same as diabetes mellitus? No. The names are similar, but diabetes insipidus is different from diabetes mellitus (sugar diabetes). Diabetes mellitus includes type 1 diabetes and type 2 diabetes. Diabetes mellitus and diabetes insipidus both make children pee often and get thirsty easily. But children with type 1 or type 2 diabetes have high blood sugar. Children with diabetes insipidus have normal blood sugar levels.

What does insipidus mean? Insipidus (in-SIP-ih-dis) means that the urine is diluted and has no odor.