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Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

nytimes.com

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Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#31

Post by iamacynic »

taneq wrote: post #25
closure wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My cardiologist told me never to try a low-sodium diet without talking with him first. He is very up-to-date on research and said that an equal number of people see blood pressure increase on low-sodium as see blood pressure decrease but for many (most?) people the difference is negligible. In other words if you are one of the ones who is very sensitive to changes in sodium you are as likely to be harmed as helped by…

Wow, so the blanket "high blood pressure = eat less salt" advice given by most doctors sounds not just unhelpful but flat-out wrong and dangerous.

not if you're the people who sell blood pressure medication...

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#32

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

tetraodonpuffer wrote: post #29
TheSpiceIsLife wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not clear how you can say "no other changes" and follow on with " of course this also implied some dietary changes, like no bread anymore due to sodium contents ". That seems like a potentially significant change you're ignoring.

fair enough, although I personally don't think that cutting bread and eating more potatoes is that big of a difference overall, it is a difference so hey, for all I know that might have influenced things. As I was saying above, n=1 after all.

That this with a grain of salt

It has been suggested that "leptin resistance is considered a primary risk factor for obesity. It has been hypothesized that dietary cereal grain protein could cause leptin resistance by preventing leptin from binding to its receptor."

"Similar to what is observed in chronic inflammation, chronically elevated leptin levels are associated with obesity, overeating, and inflammation-related diseases, including hypertension, metabolic syndrome, and cardiovascular disease."[2]

1. https://bmcbiochem.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12858...

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leptin

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#33

Post by abakker »

tetraodonpuffer wrote: post #27
Swizec wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll notice the same behavior from long distance runners, cyclists, hikers, etc. At some point you start feeling dehydration because you're missing electrolytes. If your water intake isn't salted or packed with minerals in some other way, it just makes you thirstier and thirstier. Especially when it's hot out.

disagree, I went for a 5 hour fairly hard (~2000m of climbing) bike ride last summer in hot weather with no food and drinking only plain water (and not that much water at that, around 1l during the ride, of course I had a very large breakfast beforehand) without any issues whatsoever. I am not sure about the whole "working out requires eating salt tabs", when I was doing triathlons a lot of people took them and it wa…

I wish I were like you! Before salt tabs, I'd cramp up and be useless after a pretty short time on the bike - maybe 2 hours / 2000 ft of climbing on a mountain bike. Now that I add two of those nuun tablets to my 3 L of water I sweat less and never cramp up anymore.

My sweat has always been very salty my whole life. I wish I didn't need to supplement for longer rides but time has shown me that it is unrealistic for me to skip it for anything over around 1.5 hours. Under that, I don't bother, though.

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#34

Post by yawz »

scandox wrote: post #7

This didn't surprise me so much. In several hot countries I have noted people taking salt to relieve thirst. In Mongolia I drank heavily salted tea (the usual there) all summer and it becomes quite natural. Maybe I'm missing some of the subtleties here?

AFAIK, this is usually not to relieve thirst, but to compensate for the minerals lost by perspiration.

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#35

Post by wollstonecraft »

scandox wrote: post #7

This didn't surprise me so much. In several hot countries I have noted people taking salt to relieve thirst. In Mongolia I drank heavily salted tea (the usual there) all summer and it becomes quite natural. Maybe I'm missing some of the subtleties here?

This is why the English salt tax was such a big deal to the Indians.

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#36

Post by crowbahr »

yawz wrote: post #34
scandox wrote: post #7

This didn't surprise me so much. In several hot countries I have noted people taking salt to relieve thirst. In Mongolia I drank heavily salted tea (the usual there) all summer and it becomes quite natural. Maybe I'm missing some of the subtleties here?

AFAIK, this is usually not to relieve thirst, but to compensate for the minerals lost by perspiration.

Can thirst be related to salt deficiency?

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#37

Post by jameskegel »

abakker wrote: post #33
tetraodonpuffer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

disagree, I went for a 5 hour fairly hard (~2000m of climbing) bike ride last summer in hot weather with no food and drinking only plain water (and not that much water at that, around 1l during the ride, of course I had a very large breakfast beforehand) without any issues whatsoever. I am not sure about the whole "working out requires eating salt tabs", when I was doing triathlons a lot of people took them and it wa…

I wish I were like you! Before salt tabs, I'd cramp up and be useless after a pretty short time on the bike - maybe 2 hours / 2000 ft of climbing on a mountain bike. Now that I add two of those nuun tablets to my 3 L of water I sweat less and never cramp up anymore. My sweat has always been very salty my whole life. I wish I didn't need to supplement for longer rides but time has shown me that it is unrealistic for m…

That's interesting what you said about your sweat being salty; is be interested in seeing how much electrolytes you're excreting that way. Conversely, my sweat isn't salty hardly at all, I've noticed. I wonder if there is any correlation, because I ride 50 to 60 miles, single speed on street tires, up and down elevation no problem with just regular water, never have had a cramp as far as I can remember. I don't consider myself a very fit person, and neither would a dietician, fwiw, so I'm not just some type of anomaly, just your typical desk dweller who hits the bike path hard on weekends when time allows.

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#38

Post by pkaye »

taneq wrote: post #25
closure wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My cardiologist told me never to try a low-sodium diet without talking with him first. He is very up-to-date on research and said that an equal number of people see blood pressure increase on low-sodium as see blood pressure decrease but for many (most?) people the difference is negligible. In other words if you are one of the ones who is very sensitive to changes in sodium you are as likely to be harmed as helped by…

Wow, so the blanket "high blood pressure = eat less salt" advice given by most doctors sounds not just unhelpful but flat-out wrong and dangerous.

Also I've read of some studies that less than 1500mg sodium intake for day has increased cardiovascular risks.

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#39

Post by int_19h »

pilsetnieks wrote: post #23
abovemypaygrade wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did he (or they) happen to mention the ratios of salt water to fresh? I don't know a whole lot about this topic, but I do recall reading somewhere that thirsty seafarers who succumbed to the urge to drink seawater ended up dying more quickly. I wonder if they figured out how much was okay to drink before it started negatively impacting health.

The negative impact is due to water loss via vomiting or diarrhea, and thus having a negative water balance. It's not like saltwater in itself kills you. In fact, you could drink the water of some less salty seas, e.g. the Baltic Sea.

The real bad impact is from disrupting the way your kidneys work. Basically, seawater has a higher concentration of salt than it is possible for your kidneys to remove via urine (due to the physics of that process).

For one thing, your body will try to use its existing water supply to flush the extra salt, which means that you'll be urinating (= dehydrating) more than usual. Once that's all gone, and seawater is the sole source for water in your body, your body will no longer be able to produce urine to carry the usual toxins out. Eventually your kidneys will fail.

Although in practice, you will feel like a wreck both physically and mentally long before then, and given that people in a situation where they can only drink seawater generally have other dangerous conditions to deal with, these debilitating effects can well kill you before that.

This also explains why diluting seawater is potentially viable - so long as you keep the salt concentration below the level your kidneys can handle, you can keep them working normally.

Re: Our understanding of the way the body handles salt may be wrong

#40

Post by mistermann »

PKop wrote: post #22
Swizec wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll notice the same behavior from long distance runners, cyclists, hikers, etc. At some point you start feeling dehydration because you're missing electrolytes. If your water intake isn't salted or packed with minerals in some other way, it just makes you thirstier and thirstier. Especially when it's hot out.

This simple lesson was taught to us day one in boot camp when I was in the army, and reiterated constantly over the years. We were required to take our salt packet out of our MRE's and eat the entire contents. The amount of water consumed (and flushed out through perspiration) throughout the day would have severely dehydrated anyone who didn't consume adequate (high) levels of salt.

I drink tons of water and I get lots of cramps, presumably from electrolyte shortage. Is there any way of knowing what the right amount of salt is to be consuming?
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