diff --git a/src/include/homestore/btree/detail/prefix_node.hpp b/src/include/homestore/btree/detail/prefix_node.hpp
index 62003da7a..a72b13adb 100644
--- a/src/include/homestore/btree/detail/prefix_node.hpp
+++ b/src/include/homestore/btree/detail/prefix_node.hpp
@@ -771,7 +771,7 @@ class FixedPrefixNode : public VariantNode< K, V > {
         phdr->tail_slot = phdr->used_slots;
     }
 
-#ifdef _DEBUG
+#ifndef NDEBUG
     void validate_sanity() {
         uint32_t i{0};
         // validate if keys are in ascending order