How To Reduce Your Sodium Intake

Sodium is an important element -- one that our bodies need to function properly. Sodium helps maintain our acid/base balance, signals our muscles to contract, and keeps our water balance in check. Sodium also regulates how much water our body stores and how this water is used. But many times the amount of sodium we eat is too much for our body to handle properly. Too much sodium (including table salt) can cause many health issues such as dehydration, hypertension, kidney disease and elevated blood glucose levels. Sodium causes high blood pressure when it removes water from the blood, making the heart pump harder to get blood throughout the entire body. Those with kidney disease, diabetes, and hypertension are required to eat a low sodium diet to reduce the salt burden on their system.

The recommended sodium intake is 2400mg or less a day. This is about 1 teaspoon of table salt. For those at risk for, or have been diagnosed with, hypertension, 1500mg of sodium or less is the recommended amount. Most of the food we eat contains sodium so it is very easy to meet the recommended intake—and easy to get too much. Most of the sodium/salt in an individual’s diet comes from packaged foods. There is sodium in nearly every packaged food so it is important to read the Nutrition Facts label to determine how much sodium is in a serving for the food you are planning to eat. Highly processed packaged foods such as dehydrated potatoes and other dehydrated foods, canned food, and boxed mixes have the most sodium.

To reduce the amount of sodium in your diet it is important to stick with fresh fruits and vegetables and other unprocessed, unpackaged foods. These items typically have far less sodium/salt than processed foods. Also, when you cook with whole foods you can control how much salt you put into the food. Only a small amount of the sodium we eat comes from salting your food during cooking. If you want to reduce your salt to the lowest level possible, there are many good sodium replacements that can make your food taste just as delicious without any salt. Instead of over salting, you can add lemon juice and pepper to bring out the natural flavor of the food. You can also add herbs such as rosemary and thyme. These herbs taste much better with the natural flavors of what you are cooking than a handful of salt does.

If you do not want to cook, you can choose reduced sodium packaged foods when you want to use a packaged food item, but be sure to only add a small amount of extra salt or none at all.  To have complete control over your salt intake it is best to cook your own food. If you don’t know how to cook, take a cooking class through continuing education. Learning to make a few simple low salt meals will keep you healthy and your blood pressure in check.

It is also important to drink enough water, especially if you choose to eat even reduced sodium packaged foods. Reduced sodium foods still have considerable sodium in them that can be detrimental to your health. The water you drink will keep you from becoming dehydrated. Small amounts of sodium will reduce the amount of water in the body – and water retention can also lead to weight gain.

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