Urinary problems and injuries are a concern in children. A young child may not be able to tell you about his or her symptoms, which can make it difficult to decide what your child needs. An older child may be embarrassed about his or her symptoms. When your child has a urinary problem or injury, look at all of his or her symptoms to determine what steps to take next.

The urethra, bladder, ureters, and kidneys are the structures that make up the urinary tract.

Pain during urination (dysuria) and a frequent need to urinate are common symptoms in young children. When your child has only one of these symptoms, or when the symptoms are mild, home treatment may be all that is needed to prevent the problem from getting worse and help relieve symptoms. Mild symptoms include:

• A frequent need to urinate. A child's bladder is small and does not hold as much urine as an adult's bladder. For this reason, frequent urination is common and is not necessarily a sign of a urinary problem. Your child may urinate more because he or she is drinking extra fluid, feeling nervous, or simply from habit.
• Urine that is more concentrated and appears darker, if your child is slightly dehydrated. Give your child more fluids to prevent serious problems from dehydration. As your child drinks more fluids, the color of his or her urine will return to normal.
• Burning pain when urine touches irritated skin around the vagina or urethra. Pain during urination because of skin irritation occurs more often in girls (genital skin irritation) than it does in boys.

Pain during urination and a frequent need to urinate can also mean your child has a urinary tract infection. Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are the second most common bacterial infection in children. When your child has an infection, bacteria grow in the bladder and irritate the bladder wall. This causes pain as soon as a very small amount of urine reaches the bladder. You may find your child trying to urinate more often than usual in an effort to soothe the pain. However, your child will pass very little urine because the bladder has only collected a small amount since the last time he or she urinated. Symptoms of a UTI vary depending on a child's age.

Newborns and children younger than 2

Babies and very young children who have UTIs often have symptoms that do not seem specific to the urinary tract. Symptoms may include:

• Fever, especially without other signs of infections, such as a cough or runny nose. In babies, fever may be the only symptom of a urinary tract infection.
• Frequent or infrequent urination.
• Strong or foul-smelling urine.
• Dark or blood-streaked urine. Note: It is very common for newborns to pass some pink urine in the first 10 days of life. This is caused by crystals that appear in the urine of newborns. Also during the first 10 days of life, girls may have pink urine from a small amount of normal vaginal bleeding. The parents will notice a pink color to the urine in the diaper in both cases.
• Lack of interest in eating or refusing food.
• Diarrhea.
• Vomiting.
• Squirming and irritability.
• Diaper rash that doesn't go away.

Children age 2 years and older