5yr old pooing in pants

[EdmundSlackbladder]

Just wondering if anyone can offer any advice on this situation. Over the last few weeks, maybe a month or two now my 5yr DS has repeatedly soiled himself. Not always a huge amount, sometimes just little bits. Other times it's large amounts of poo and he'll have it in his pants for some time without it seeming to bother him. He also wets himself fairly frequently, not the whole lot, but a small bit before he gets to the toilet.
We've tried having conversations with him about how important it is to use the toilet properly and get there on time. I have tried to find out if he's unaware it's happening and if perhaps it's physiological and I need to take him to the doctors or of he's just leaving it too late.
It's getting more and more frequent and I'm running out of ideas. Does anyone have experience of this or any ideas on how I can next approach? I'm at the end of my tether.

Could well be constipation, that can cause all the symptoms you describe-even if he is going to the loo, if there's some impaction it can cause leaking, soiling and wetting yourself. Take him to the dr, they'll probably give him movicol which will help

My answer was going to be exactly that ^

Thanks. I'll look into it.

I had this with DD1 whose 6 on and off until not very long ago, took her too the doctors who wondered if it was constipation but her tummy always felt empty.
It would happen almost every school day for weeks then stop for a while before starting again.
This time it's been a few months since it last happened, it would occasional be at the weekend as well and seemed to be when we were out and she was playing.
In the end we came to the conclusion she was too busy to stop playing and tried to hold on which never worked, I could tell in her face when she was 'squeezing'.
We talked to her about it and she always said she didn't know why but knew it had happened and eventually said she didn't want to miss out whatever game they were playing at school at break.
We can't see that anything has changed apart from maybe being more aware that other children could pick up on it now they are older and not wanting others to know she had dirtied herself.

It may be constipation but in case not this could be another avenue to look into.