THE DOCTOR’S CORNER
Is Salt Bad For You?
by Dr. Timothy Grondin

Restricting salt in the diet is one of conventional nutrition's most well known ideas. Salt, they say, will cause high blood pressure and increase your risk of heart disease. While this may be true for a few salt sensitive people, it doesn't apply to most of you. No study on the general population has ever found an association between low-sodium diets and reduced risk of heart disease.

In one study that took a number of years to complete, those people with high blood pressure were asked to increase the salt in their diets. They were monitored closely and the average blood pressure increase was only two to four points. Not very much.

In another eight-year study of people with high blood pressure living in New York, it was found that those on low-salt diets had more than four times as many heart attacks as those with normal sodium intakes.

Why would this be? Because salt is essential for life, you can't live without it.

The problem with the salt intake here in the United States has to do with the fact that more than 75% of it in the average American's diet comes from processed foods, like fast food, packaged snacks, convenience foods and restaurant meals. And the salt that is used in processed foods is also highly processed and not the natural salt your body needs to function correctly.

Not all salt is created equally. There are actually major differences between standard refined table salt and natural health promoting salt. Your table salt is actually 97.5% sodium chloride and 2.5 percent chemicals such as moisture absorbents and iodine. This salt is dried at an excessively high temperature - over 1,200 degrees Fahrenheit - that actually changes the ionic structure of the salt.

When your body tries to eliminate the excess processed salt, it has to use a lot of water to handle the job; the body takes it from your cells, which throw the fluid balance off in the body, there's less in the cells but more in the circulation. This can lead to unsightly cellulite, rheumatism, arthritis, gout, kidney and gallstones... not good.

So my recommendation is to eat natural salt like Celtic Sea Salt or Himalayan salt. These salts are dried naturally, not chemically processed, and actually contain many minerals that your body needs. Personally, I prefer the Celtic sea salt and recommend it to my patients because it has the most minerals, but either one will do as they taste much better and are unprocessed salts and are not associated with many of the problems of commercial salts.

Yours in Health

Dr. Grondin

If you have any questions or suggestions for future topics, feel free to e-mail Dr. Grondin at docgrondin@advnet.net, or call his office at 810-984-3344.

Dr. Timothy Grondin started his career as a medic (corpsman) in the Navy where he examined, diagnosed and treated people for minor illnesses under the direction of an M.D. When Grondin left the military, he became a nurse and worked on the medical/surgical ward at Pontiac Osteopathic Hospital for a number of years. Though he began taking pre-med courses at Oakland University, Grondin changed his mind, choosing to become a Chiropractor instead. Grondin graduated from Palmer College of Chiropractic in 1988, and has been in practice in Port Huron since 1989.

DISCLAIMER: The information provided here is intended for educational purposes only. It is not meant to either directly or indirectly diagnose, give medical advice or prescribe treatment. Please consult with your physician or other licensed health care professional for medical diagnosis and treatment.