Osteoporosis
Every year osteoporosis causes more deaths than cervical cancer and breast
cancer combined.
Decrease in ability to retain
electrolyte balance affects bone metabolism.170 Low potassium intake increases
urinary excretion of calcium and phosphorous.171 Although association doesn't
necessarily signify causation, it is more than coincidence that the rise in
osteoporosis and other bone disorders have increased as potassium intake has
decreased.
Excess sodium causes loss of
calcium and potassium in a persons urine.
The more sodium a person eats -
the more calcium their body loses in their urine. To compensate 5 the human body
increases calcium absorption -and when there isn't enough of the right kind of
calcium in their diet^ the body starts plundering the calcium reserves in their
bones.
Years ages researcher Ailsa
Goulding dramatically demonstrated how sodium can damage bones. Working with
female lab animals whose ovaries were removed (to simulate menopause), Goulding
fed the lab animals diets low in calcium. When she added sodium to the lab
animals diet., their bones became markedly less dense. In other words, sodium
significantly increased the damage done to the lab animals bones.4
4. A. Goulding and D. Campbell, "Dietary NaCI Loads Promote Calcium and Bone
Loss in Adult Osteoporosismized Rats Consuming allow Calcium Diet" Journal of
Nutrition 113, No. 7 July 1983): 1409-1414.
What's true of lab animals is
also true of humans. Studying nearly 600 women between the ages of sixteen and
eighty-two., Goulding measured their urine levels of sodium. In addition, she
measured levels of the amino acid hydroxyproline. (Because hydroxyproline is
eliminated in the urine when bone breaks down, it can be used as a measure of
bone loss.) Goulding found a powerful correlation between levels of
sodium and hydroxyproline., indicating that more bone is "dissolved" when sodium
levels are high.5
5. A- Goulding, "Fasting Urinary Sodium/Creatinine in Relation to
Calrium/Creadnlne and Hydroxyproline/Creadnine in a General Population of
Women," New Zealand Journal, 93 (1981): 294-297.
More evidence linking sodium to
osteoporosis comes from Amanda Devine and colleagues, who assessed the bone
mineral density of 124 post-menopausal women. As expected, the bone density of
most of the women declined over the two-year period of the study. Dietary
calcium helped prevent the decline, but a high-sodium diet, as indicated by
high urinary sodium, strongly tended to increase bone loss. Devine and
colleagues concluded that reducing sodium intake during the menopausal years
appears to be as important in preventing osteoporosis as more than doubling the
average calcium intake of American women! 7
7. A. Devine, R. A. Criddle, I. M. Dick, D. A. Kerr, and R. L. Prince, "A
Longitudinal Study of the Effect of Sodium and Calcium Intakes on Regional Bone
Density in Postmenopausal Women," American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 62
(1995):74°-745-
Postmenopausal women, however.,
aren't the only people who need to worry about sodium damaging their bones. Both
men and women with high blood pressure are strong candidates for sodium linked
bone loss, because people with high blood pressure lose more calcium in their
urine than do those with normal blood pressure.9
9. Graham A. MacGregor and Francesco P. Cappudno, "The Kidney and Essential
Hypertension: A Link to Osteoporosis?"7(Wr-nal ofHypertension n, No. 8 (1993):
781-785.
There's another reason, too, why
men should worry about the sodium-bone connection. While women suffer from
osteoporosis more often than men, research indicates that sodium may be
especially dangerous to male bones.
One research group tested
hundreds of men and women, and found that "for a given sodium intake, men had
significantly greater urinary calcium losses than did women." 10
10. Bess Dawson-Hughes, Sarah Fowler, Gail Dalsky, and Christopher Gallagher,
Sodium Excretion and Calcium Homeostasis in Elderly Men, Study conducted for the
United States Department of Agriculture, Feb. 20, 1996.
Clearly, adults who want healthy
bones need to break the high-sodium habit. As do children, because a high-sodium
or low-calcium diet during childhood is dangerous to long-term bone health.
Researchers at Ohio State University11 recently measured bone mineral density in
381 girls between the ages of eight and thirteen, and obtained food diaries from
these volunteers. As expected, the amount of calcium the girls ate strongly
predicted how dense their bones were.
11. V. Matkovic, J. Z. Ilich, M. B. Andon, I. C. Hsieh, M. A. Tzagoumis, B.J.
Lagger, et al., "Urinary Calcium, Sodium, and Bone Mass of Young Females,"
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 61 (1995): 417-425.
But the researchers also found
that the factor linked most strongly to high urinary calcium—that is, the amount
of calcium "thrown away" by the human body—was a high-sodium diet. Clearly,
girls or boys who indulge in junk foods which have a lot of sodium in them may
be setting the stage for fragile bones and life-threatenins traumas later in
life.
A low-potassium diet^ conversely,
increases the rate at which individuals lose calcium through their urine, and
thus, presumably, increases the rate at which their bones break down.13
A. Sebastion and colleagues 15 at
the University of California at San Francisco recently reported similar findings
in the New England Journal of Medicine. "In postmenopausal women/9 the
researchers said the oral administration of potassium.... improves calcium and
phosphorus balance, reduces bone restoration, and increases the rate of bone
formation."
13. Jacob Lemann,Jr.,Joan A. Pleuss, and Richard W. Gray, "Potassium Causes
Calcium Retention in Healthy Adults," Journal of Nutrition 123 (1993):
1623-1626.
15. A- Sebastion, S. T. Harris,;. H. Ottaway, KL M. Todd, and R. C. Morris Jr.,
"Improved Mineral Balance and Skeletal Metabolism in Postmenopausal Women
Treated with Potassium Bicarbonate," New England Journal of Medicine 330, No.
25 (June 23, 1994):1776-1781.
You expect a lot of sodium in
salty foods.
But you might be surprised to
discover that a one-ounce serving of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes contains nearly
twice as much sodium as an ounce of Planters Cocktail Peanuts—260 milligrams
versus 132. You know potato chips are salty. But would you guess that two slices
of Pepperidge Farm White Bread contain more sodium than a one-ounce bag of Lay
PotatoChips?
They did—234 milligrams for the bread, 191 for the chips. And if you put a
three-slice serving of Oscar Mayer Bologna between those two slices of
Pepperidge Farm bread, you'd get an additional 672 milligrams of sodium.
One bite tells you that bacon is
salty.
But how about a sweet pudding?
One-half cup of Jell-0 Chocolate
Flavor Instant Pudding contained 404 milligrams of sodium, 102 milligrams more
than a three slice serving of Oscar Mayer Bacon.
In fact, there's sodium—sometimes
lots of it—in almost everything you eat, from the briniest pickles to the
sweetest chocolate syrups and candy bars.
¼ pound Cooked ground beef 76
milligrams
¼ pnd Commercial hamburger 950 mil
¼ pnd Corned beef 1,069 mil
2 hotdogs 1,254 mil1/2 pnd sliced
ham 1,399 mil
½ cup Cooked brown rice 3 mil
½ cup white rice 383 mil
Fresh corn on the cob (trace)
One pound can cooked corn 302 mil
How to Read Food Labels for Hidden
Salt
C. Jane Wyatt, Ph.D., of the
department of food science and technology at Oregon State University,
interviewed 40 people who had been put on sodium-restricted diets by their
doctors. Most knew that snack foods like potato chips and crackers, as well as
onion salt,
ham and sauerkraut, are high in salt.
Many, however, were not aware
that several other foods—
instant chicken noodle soup mix,
ketchup,
mustard,
fried chicken TV dinner,
salad dressings,
meat tenderizer,
nondairy creamer and
gelatin dessert—are also high in sodium.
Yet most of them claimed they read
labels.
Part of the problem could be the
many forms that sodium takes as a food additive, says Dr. Wyatt. Aside from salt
itself, some of the most common sodium-containing additives are:
sodium citrate,
sodium nitrate,
sodium benzoate,
monosodium glutamate (MSG),
sodium ascorbate,
sodium caseinate,
disodium metabisulfate, and sodium EDTA.
Additives
collectively referred to as stabilizers, emulsifiers and preservatives are also
likely to contain sodium (Journal of Food Science, March/April, 1980).
Only you can prevent early
diseases. Be healthy by eating the correct vitamins that are missing from your
food source.
This information supplied by the makers of GNLD vitamins.
What is your vitamin company warning you about?
Back to
Home Page