Salt intake

[Bailee]

Hi I’m recently diagnosed with Pots and my care team of nurses and doctors I think gave me the wrong measurements of sodium in mg to salt in gram. I told them I was taking about 3000-4000 mg of salt a day which according to my conversation is 7.5 to 10 grams a day. However when I called and double checked the nurse told me this is only about 3-4 grams of salt a day and to increase due to symptoms of lightheadedness. She said pots patients do anywhere between 3-10 grams a day. She told the ratio is 1:1 to 3000 mg equal 3 grams of salt . So I upped my intake to 8000 mg a day . Tracking in MyFitnessPal. I was thinking there’s no way I can get all this salt in without making me self sick so I double checked multiple sources on information for salt for the dysautonomia and pots patients. They all say this 

8 grams of salt pr day x  387.6 milligrams of sodium per gram of salt
= 3101 mg of sodium per day

So have I been takin 16 grams a day or … I’ll link the conversion below

 

[MikeO]

@Bailee I go by the amount of sodium intake as the number differs from the common salt measurement. Also perse i teaspoon of table salt  (sodium content) will differ from 1 teaspoon of sea salt.

Here is a good read on the subject. Also if you look at the nutrition labels of foods it will list sodium and not salt. 

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/16881-sodium--heart-health  

[TCP]

I was just told to take 10gs per day and 3.5litres of fluids. I was told to drink a mix of fluids so I drink soup, water and herb teas. I couldn’t take that much salt as it would have made me so sick so just sprinkled in my food and that was it. 

[GasconAlex]

It depends. Sodium is a part of sodium chloride (salt) so the mass of sodium is only part of the total weight of salt, hence the conversion tables.

But sodium is present in lots of other compounds too (such as sodium bicarbonate) and lots of other naturally occurring in foods and drinks. This makes life complicated!

If you are trying to increase your blood pressure then salt increase can help but just trying to have as much as you are comfortable with is a good rule of thumb. Increasing your salt massively will not increase the BP in a linear manner. Salt can increase (or decrease) your BP by 5 to 10 mmHg so is quite useful. 

Similarly drinking lots of fluids can add even more but then you need the toilet lots too which makes life difficult.

As far as I know if you are having a high salt diet make sure that you test your blood sodium and potassium as well as kidney function regularly because you really don't want to damage extra things.

 

 

[CallieAndToby]

None of my doctors really told me how much salt to add to my diet but they all told me to increase it and I've just found what's worked for me. Dr. Randy Thompson got me started on dissolvable salt tablets that you put in water and drink and told me to do that 2-3 times a day; they can be bought at health food stores. And as @GasconAlexmentioned, certain foods are already high in sodium like canned soups and canned meats, etc. Sorry I can't be more helpful, I was never really given a number. Electrolyte drinks are really helpful for some but they flare my bladder because I have interstitial cystitis (can't tolerate potassium or citric acid) but if you can handle drinking them they definitely have a lot of good stuff and were specifically created for athletes. There are probably some resources online with recommendations on amounts.

[MikeO]

Well might as well break out the popcorn on this subject. Can't say how much sodium (salt) works for some folks i did have the conversation with my care team. We do talk in terms of sodium. I can see using the "please pass the salt at the family dinner table" but it is the sodium numbers that need to be watched.

We put my cap on 2500 mg of sodium which is more that enough to retain fluids. if i go well over that (10 mg) i run into trouble.