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Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

nytimes.com

31–40 of 55 posts

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#31

Also mitigated many millions of hangovers, including my own. Too bad the commercial nature of “sports drinks” have dialed up the sugar and broke away from the clinical goal of rehydration.

they sell sugar free sports drinks

That's the point. A little sugar is good. Too much sugar is bad. No suger is not as good. It's very modern to have two options, one with waaay too much sugar and one with zero sugar (or some sugar replacement).

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gatorade has a entire line of drinks for different purposes. Zero is what OP is looking for: https://performancepartner.gatorade.com/content/products/hyd... The normal one is for high powered endurance activities and contains some carbs (sugar) to help fuel you through them. They have one with even more carbs, sodium and potassium for people running marathons. The last two on that chart aren't a good choice for someo…

Propel and Zero (the first options) both contain sucralose, aka Splenda - I'd prefer to just drink salt water personally, or take the hit on a tablespoon of sugar mixed in and walk it off.

I like pickle juice. The vinegar helps the salt go down better.

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#33

So I had cholera. I was in a cholera study at the University of Maryland for a week. Read a lot of sci fi, played ping pong and drank fluids with electrolytes. There is a first phase which is uncomfortable but otherwise, as the docs said, cholera is a piece of cake if treated with hydration.

Whoa! I didn't know you could do such studies on humans this day and age. Were you compensated handsomely?

https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2024/10/21/i-got-dysentery-s... is a writeup of a similar trial that hit HN recently. That person got $4000 for 10 days.

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#34

So I had cholera. I was in a cholera study at the University of Maryland for a week. Read a lot of sci fi, played ping pong and drank fluids with electrolytes. There is a first phase which is uncomfortable but otherwise, as the docs said, cholera is a piece of cake if treated with hydration.

Whoa! I didn't know you could do such studies on humans this day and age. Were you compensated handsomely?

Yup, they are called Human Challenge Studies. Compensation is typically modest. Most participants are students at universities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_challenge_study

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#35
I also have a feeling that the pH of rehydration drinks should be low (acidic). To an extent, my body knows pretty well what's good for it. The salt+water tastes terrible, add a little acid and it's delicious. Maybe it takes a little load off of the digestive system by providing the acid that would otherwise need to be generated.

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#36
post #23

for a few moments I was thinking "saved millions of dollars from dehydration". The title could be clearer if it said "saved millions of people from dehydration".

I wonder if headline writers these days generate several permutations of a headline via GPT, and have some way of A|B testing the early readers to figure out which one generates the most clicks (especially due to people clicking through to satiate curiosity of a freshly quizzical headline from what would otherwise have been an at-a-glance comprehensible one that would fail to elicit the all-lifegiving click.)

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#37

Also mitigated many millions of hangovers, including my own. Too bad the commercial nature of “sports drinks” have dialed up the sugar and broke away from the clinical goal of rehydration.

You can always make your own sports drink, starting with the recipe from the World Health Organization:

https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/WHO-FCH-CAH-06.1

Just 4 ingredients:

Glucose, anhydrous (dextrose)

Sodium chloride (salt)

Potassium chloride

Trisodium citrate, dihydrate

Of course, the batch size of 75 kg may not be the most convenient for home use, but it's easy to scale down.

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#38

Regarding the dehydration work see: > Oral rehydration therapy (ORT) is a type of fluid replacement used to prevent and treat dehydration, especially due to diarrhea.[1] It involves drinking water with modest amounts of sugar and salts, specifically sodium and potassium.[1] Oral rehydration therapy can also be given by a nasogastric tube.[1] Therapy can include the use of zinc supplements to reduce the duration of di…

ORT seems to have been developed in the mid 1960s, around the same time as Gatorade.

I wonder how much one informed the other.

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#39

Regarding the dehydration work see: > Oral rehydration therapy (ORT) is a type of fluid replacement used to prevent and treat dehydration, especially due to diarrhea.[1] It involves drinking water with modest amounts of sugar and salts, specifically sodium and potassium.[1] Oral rehydration therapy can also be given by a nasogastric tube.[1] Therapy can include the use of zinc supplements to reduce the duration of di…

ORT seems to have been developed in the mid 1960s, around the same time as Gatorade. I wonder how much one informed the other.

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatorade#Origin

Re: Richard A. Cash, who saved millions from dehydration, has died

#40

Also mitigated many millions of hangovers, including my own. Too bad the commercial nature of “sports drinks” have dialed up the sugar and broke away from the clinical goal of rehydration.

Generic Pedialyte is great for hangovers and migraines—way less sugar. You can even get the individual powder packets instead of having to buy a huge jug of liquid.
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