A monthly period of symptoms associated with benign prostatic hyperplasia

The number of times that a man with benign prostatic hyperplasia awoke each night with the urge to urinate (nocturia) was analyzed for randomness by Bartlett's Kolmogorov-Smirnov white noise test and for a periodic component by Fourier analysis. The data series (n = 1549) was not white noise; it had a peak periodic component of 25 days, with a range of 21 to 37 days. The possibility that the monthly period of nocturia is a general phenomenon and is coupled to a monthly menstrual period, and the implications for more accurate diagnosis and new modes of therapy, are discussed. Copyright (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Inc.