{"id":31859,"date":"2025-01-27T11:26:53","date_gmt":"2025-01-27T17:26:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/blog\/?p=31859"},"modified":"2025-01-27T11:26:56","modified_gmt":"2025-01-27T17:26:56","slug":"hydration-and-longevity-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wholehealthchicago.com\/blog\/2025\/01\/27\/hydration-and-longevity-2025","title":{"rendered":"Hydration and Longevity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

You\u2019ll like this story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sometime in her eighties, my Aunt Hildy, who passed on at 94 or so, handed me a book, \u201cYour Body\u2019s Many Cries for Water\u201d, by an Iranian physician with a totally unpronounceable name, Fereydoon Batmanghelidj, M.D. She told me it had changed her life. Dr. B. attributed virtually all chronic illnesses, premature death, and susceptibility to infections to the state of chronic dehydration we had allowed ourselves to endure by our insufficient intake of water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because Dr. B. also felt that water had curative properties, his work was literally shredded by conventional physicians here in the U.S., where he was regarded as a \u201ccrank\u201d and a \u201cquack\u201d. The Wikipedia entry<\/a> is especially brutal since it\u2019s written by Stephen Barrett of Quackwatch, which (if you bother to read it) seems to have a special loathing for Dr. B.<\/a> because of his claims that good hydration promotes longevity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so the years pass. Dr. B. dies at 74, although his books (he wrote seven more) all remain in print, apparently being read by the well-hydrated, healthy, and generally ignored by the desiccated conventional physicians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A group of researchers at the National Institutes of Health, Institute of Aging, in Bethesda, Maryland, had been exploring why some people seem to age faster than others, why some people seem to develop any of that list of chronic illnesses we all know are associated with abbreviated longevities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The illnesses most associated with early death are, of course, heart and lung disease, kidney disease, cancer, dementia, diabetes, strokes, and peripheral vascular diseases. They had an idea it might be related to hydration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The concentration of the element sodium in your blood is a good measurement of the state of your hydration. The normal range of serum sodium is 135 to 146 mm\/mol\/L (don\u2019t ask), and they selected a person\u2019s serum sodium above 141 to be \u201cdehydrated\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then, examining health records of over 15,000 middle-aged patients (age range 45-66), they discovered that the single most protective factor to avoid chronic illness (and therefore avoid an early death, i.e. \u201canti-aging\u201d was to maintain serum sodium of 141 or lower), i.e., be \u201cwell hydrated\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the other end of the hydration spectrum, you ramp up your risk of \u2018all cause chronic illness and early death\u2019 by being chronically dehydrated, serum sodium 142 or higher. Hang on, but also, based on mouse models and computer nerds in their finest hour, this hydration translates to a difference of fifteen years of lifespan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The article itself is linked here<\/a>, and it does contain a lot of graphs and math. There are a total of 63 articles referenced, but of course, Dr. B\u2019s books go unmentioned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back in 2007, after I had read Dr. B\u2019s book, I wrote this Health Tip of Water Intake. I leave it intact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My patients ask me all the time how much water they should be drinking each day. It\u2019s a good question. Generally speaking, you\u2019ll feel and look better when you\u2019re well-hydrated. Your kidneys will more easily be able to flush out waste products and environmental toxins, and your skin will have a healthy glow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s surprising is how often routine lab tests show that people walk around in a mildly dehydrated state. I return lab tests to patients with my comments, and by far the most common is, \u201cEverything\u2019s fine except it looks as if you need to be drinking more water.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Your water requirements, at a minimum:<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n