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How to Keep Your Kidneys Healthy and Functional

Your kidneys filter about 200 quarts of bodily fluids per day. This filtration process keeps your blood clean and ejects waste from your body by sending them into your bladder. Once your kidneys begin to fail, your overall health will suffer almost immediately. However, your kidneys are resilient. As long as you take a few steps to preserve their integrity, they should last a lifetime.

  1. Hydrate

    • Drink water every day. Instead of worrying about how much water to drink, try substituting water for the other beverages which you are accustomed to drinking. You do not need these other liquids in your diet and you will not miss them. Furthermore, eliminating non-water beverages from your diet will remove all the contaminants in these other drinks that can overwork your kidneys as they try to remove unnecessary substances from your blood.

    Eat Fruits and Vegetables

    • Add more fruits and vegetables to your diet to keep your kidneys healthy. These foods are high in vitamins, in phytochemicals and in antioxidants that actually assist your kidneys in cleaning blood and eliminating free radicals, which are molecules that cause cell death. They also have anti-inflammatory properties which will prevent your kidneys from suffering damage during normal functioning. Do not worry about how many servings to eat each day. Simply replace snacks with these foods and include one in every meal.

    Avoid Sodium

    • Choose foods for your daily menu that are low in sodium. This substance interferes with kidney function in more than one way. Sodium is an electrolyte and your body must maintain an exact balance of this substance to keep blood pressure normal. Your kidneys become stressed having to remove extra amounts of it. Also, the high blood pressure that sodium causes is damaging to all your organs, including your kidneys.

    Keep Your Weight Down

    • Maintain a low-fat diet that's low in sugar. In large quantities, these nutrients contribute to significant weight gain. Higher weight increases the amount of fluid that the kidneys must process each day and the amount of stress that they undergo.

    Kick the Habit

    • Stop smoking, drinking or using drugs. If you do not do any of these things, continue to avoid their use. All toxins must be removed by the kidneys as part of their daily work. By purposefully ingesting these toxins, you threaten your kidneys with overwork. Smoking, in particular, has a damaging effect on the artery leading to the kidney.

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