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How Much Water Do You Need Every Day?

How Much Water Do You Need Every Day?

Water covers nearly three quarters of our planet’s surface, falls on us as rain and snow, sustains all life, and is as misunderstood as it is taken for granted.  We drink it, wash with it, play in it, grow our food with it, and use it to carry away our waste, but most of us never give it a great deal of thought.

You don’t need to be a specialist to understand water’s health benefits, however, so you may want to consider these essential facts.

Weight control: Anybody who has successfully lost weight and kept it off will tell you that drinking water — which is calorie free — before every meal and throughout the day will make you feel more full. Eating foods with high water content, such as fresh fruits and vegetables, creates the same satiating effect while adding only minimal calories to your diet.

Fluid balance: Each one of us is about 60 percent water. Water drives digestion, absorption of nutrients, and circulation, while maintaining the body’s internal temperature. When you’re thirsty, your body is telling you it needs to replenish its fluids, and you ignore those signals at your peril. Of course, you can drink any liquid — any liquid except booze, that is. Although alcohol is a liquid, it actually dehydrates you and depletes your body’s fluids.

Good for your muscles: Fluid is essential to the health of every cell in your body, and if those cells don’t get enough fluid they will literally dry up and die. If you’re exercising or exerting yourself physically in some way, you’ll need even more fluid to stay healthy.

A good hair day and a good skin day: Your skin and hair are made up of those same water-hungry cells. Drinking enough water won’t reverse the aging process, but your skin will certainly look more dry and wrinkled if you don’t drink enough.

Getting rid of waste and toxins: Our cells remove wastes and toxins by excreting urine and solid matter, and all of that waste removal also requires water. Without enough water, your urine will become dark and smelly, and you’ll be constipated because your intestines will be forced to draw water from your solid waste. And if that’s not enough to convince you, highly concentrated urine can lead to kidney stones, which are really, really painful.

So how much water do you need? Not so long ago, the conventional wisdom urged everyone to consume 64 ounces of water a day – or eight 8-ounce glasses — but today experts say we need even more than that. Many variables dictate the amount of water that each one of us needs, including your weight and activity level, whether you live at a high altitude or in a hot climate, and your overall health. In general, you should drink between half an ounce and an ounce of water for every pound of weight – that’s between 75 and 150 ounces, or roughly three to five quarts, for someone who weighs 150 pounds. Symptoms of illness such as fever, vomiting, and diarrhea will mean you’ll need still more fluid to replenish what you’ve lost.

Too much water? Hyponatremia is a rare condition that occurs when your kidneys can’t get rid of excess water. The minerals (electrolytes) in your blood become too diluted and cause your blood sodium to drop to dangerously low levels. Symptoms include nausea, vomiting, memory loss, confusion, and lethargy. But hyponatremia generally has an underlying medical cause (kidney disease, congestive heart failure, liver failure among them) , and isn’t caused by simply drinking too much.

Photo: Wikipedia

Skin Cancer: Not Just A Summer Thing

Skin Cancer: Not Just A Summer Thing

Summer is ending and with it those long, lazy weekend days at the beach or, pool, getting in some extra hours of cycling, running, and walking, or just hanging out on a lawn chair with friends and some cold drinks.  The sun is strong and hot and oh so relaxing. It’s just the thing you need to unwind from the work week. It’s so comforting in fact that most of us forget that in those rays lurks serious danger, even death. Haven’t figured out where we’re going with this yet?  Skin cancer!  And don’t think it’s something you only have to worry about in the summer. The sun is with us 365 days a year, and even though the weather may be cold in your part of the country, wherever the sun shines, skin cancer is a risk.

According to the Skin Cancer Foundation, there are three main types of skin cancer, all with somewhat similar sets of symptoms. And skin cancer, or more accurately cancers, can happen to anyone, at any age, and of any skin color.

Some 2.8 million Americans a year are diagnosed with basal cell carcinoma or BCC, the most common form of skin cancer. So called because it occurs in the basal cells of the skin – the inner part of the skin’s outer layer (epidermis), BCC often looks like a sore that doesn’t heal, a patch of pink or red, or a shiny bump.  Though it rarely spreads beyond the original tumor site, and therefore is rarely life-threatening, BCC can be disfiguring if left untreated. The most frequent cause is the sun’s UV (ultra-violet) radiation, and what you need to know is that you are at risk whether you routinely spend time baking in the sun or you just subject yourself to infrequent intense bursts.

In addition to basal cells, the skin’s epidermis has many layers of squamous cells, and these can be the location of squamous cell carcinoma or SCC.  Like BCC, their initial symptoms can be a sore that doesn’t heal, a patch of pink or red, or a shiny bump, that’s where the similarity ends.

Caused mainly by cumulative, as opposed to short-term exposure to the sun’s UV radiation, if left untreated SCC can be disfiguring and can even kill you if it spreads to other organs (yes the skin is an organ). The Skin Cancer Foundation estimates that 700,000 people are diagnosed with SCC each year, and of those some 2,500 cases result in death. What’s more, although they occur mostly on areas of the body that get frequent sun exposure (arms, legs, face, ears, lips, torso, feet), they can crop up in the mucous membranes and the genitals.

Of the three most common forms of skin cancer melanoma is the most dangerous. Melanoma develops when skin- cell mutations (defects in a cell’s genetic material) are generated by damaged DNA – damage such as that caused by UV radiation from the sun or tanning beds. The result is rapid and uncontrolled growth in the pigment-producing cells (melanocytes) of the epidermis. Melanomas often resemble moles, and some even develop from moles. Their color ranges from black or brown (the majority) to pretty much anything –  skin-colored, pink, red, purple, blue or white. Again, UV radiation is the cause, and those with a family history are at higher risk. Caught and treated early on, it’s usually curable, but note that the US death rate from Melanoma is nearly 10,000 per year.

Obviously the best way to treat skin cancer is to prevent it.  Check out the Skin Cancer Foundation’s Prevention Guide for helpful tips. Your life may depend on it.

Photo: cancer.gov