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all right welcome back everyone to
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plant-based Kidney Health as always I'm
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Dr Sean Hashmi my partner is Michelle
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crossmer Michelle we are back for
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another episode and I gotta tell you I
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was just looking at the numbers this is
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our episode number 104.
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that's a lot
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for those of you guys who are joining us
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for the first time you got 103 more
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episodes to watch to learn all about
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kidney disease and what's fascinating is
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is after doing over a hundred episodes
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we're still getting questions and we're
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still realizing there's so many topics
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we haven't even covered yet yeah it's
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crazy when we you know look at the
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comments and suggestions on episodes I
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mean at the uh Google list that I have
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where you know I keep everything
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there's like hundreds and hundreds of
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topics on there so again we're keeping
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track of them we try to do these as
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often as we can but definitely there's
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some that come up and we're are asked
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multiple times over and over again so
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and then we like to address them so
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all right so with that guys today's
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topic is all about metabolic acidosis
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what the heck is it and why should you
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care so let's start by telling you a
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little bit about what happens in your
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body and why the kidneys are so vital to
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what happens you know when you have your
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kidneys that are functioning normally
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they do this remarkable job of balancing
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the acid and the base in the body if you
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get too much of Base in the body or too
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much of acid in the body they're the
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ones who regulate it now your breathing
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is something that can do it short term
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so in other words if you have too much
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acid in the body what's going to happen
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is you're going to start to breathe
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faster because you want to blow off the
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acid from your lungs out there and the
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idea there is you're creating an
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environment with more bass inside your
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body to counteract the acid but that's a
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very limited amount of work you can do
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and that's short term long term is the
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job of the kidneys so when we talk about
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acidosis acid or too much acid is
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actually an independent risk factor for
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the progression of kidney disease so
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here's where it becomes interesting as
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kidneys get worse you start to get more
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acid buildup inside the body as more
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acid builds up inside the body it makes
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the kidneys worse so you gotta
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understand this Loop because too many
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people only think it's a one-way street
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but it's actually both ways and so the
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reason we want to be concerned about it
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is because when you start to have it now
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symptoms wise you're going to have all
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sorts of symptoms acutely so you might
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see that your heart rate is beating
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faster wide because you're trying to
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breathe faster you may feel really weak
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or really tired you might even have
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headaches or confusion because of the
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acid that's starting to build up and
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some people will come back and say
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there's a loss of appetite so in
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advanced kidney disease acidosis can
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cause
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loss of appetite but so can the buildup
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of toxins and how do you know which one
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is which we have treatment so we'll get
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to in a second as far as that goes but
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it's not just the short-term effects
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it's the long-term effects so what are
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the long-term effects of acid so acid as
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you know if I was to pour acid inside
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you know Michelle's house she would kill
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me first of all but let's say I got away
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with that and I poured it on the floor
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what does it do to the floor it eats
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away at the floor now I imagine that
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extra acid inside your body what does it
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do to your bones
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it causes osteoporosis it leeches out
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all the minerals from your bones so
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metabolic acidosis will lead to a much
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higher risk that you're going to break
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your bones get fractured when we talk
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about kids for example when kids have
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kidney disease what happens if we leave
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the acidosis there they can't grow to be
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their full potential so in other words
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it can prevent the release of growth
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hormone in young people and growth
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hormone in young people is needed for
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proper growth now kidney disease the
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challenge that you have is the more acid
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you have the more it's going to cause
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that kidney function to start to decline
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faster and faster and faster and it's
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not limited to Bones it's not limited to
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kidneys it also starts to cause muscle
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loss so this is really fascinating
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because excess acid will eat away at the
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muscles and the muscles will start to
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break down and if you've seen folks who
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are older we talk about muscle wasting
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well in kidney disease it's the same
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concept that there's muscle wasting and
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then the other part of this that ends up
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happening is this acid or acidic
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environments they can happen for couple
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of things so for example if you're a
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diabetic and you have a lot more
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metabolic which is the body acidosis you
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will also find that you have insulin
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resistance and so this makes it
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difficult because blood sugar levels are
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going to run higher and if you watch one
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of her previous episodes where we talked
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about sugar and how sugar is causally
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meaning cause and effect is causally
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linked to kidney disease now you have an
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environment with more acid leading to
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more insulin resistance leading to more
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sugar which is leading to kidneys
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getting worse and then the final thing
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you want to know about this is what is
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the ultimate thing that happens it leads
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to early death and so as a result of all
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of this there's lots of treatments now
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Michelle's going to talk about what the
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food options are but we also have pills
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and those pill options are really things
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like sodium bicarbonate we don't really
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use potassium bicarbonate that much
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because kidney patients potassium is
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already high but it's sodium bicarbonate
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the other thing is we use sodium citrate
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citrate is just a precursor meaning it
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converts into bicarbonate but keep in
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mind the word sodium is in all of the
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things we're mentioning so we'll talk
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about all the wonderful negative things
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that the word sodium comes with but
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before we do that as we're talking about
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options on how to correct
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metabolic acidosis Michelle when we
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think about this what about fruits and
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veggies you know as we talk about this
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stuff can fruits and veggies sort of
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step in and do stuff kind of like what
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sodium bicarbonate can do
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yeah so the capacity of any food to
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produce either acid or Alkali is called
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the potential renal acid load and we've
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talked about this in other episodes
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um but protein-rich Foods produce more
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acid and fruits and vegetables produce
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more Alkali or more face and so they've
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actually
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um there was a study that they looked at
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it was a five-year study but they looked
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at non-diabetic kidney disease patients
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that had acidosis and they were assigned
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either to sodium bicarbonate fruits and
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veggies or just their usual care and so
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after the five years what they found is
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that both the sodium bicarbonate group
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so the people prescribe that medication
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and the fruit and veggie group both
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raised their serum bicarbonate levels so
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it helped to treat the metabolic
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acidosis but the people who were in the
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fruit and veggie group had
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um better cardiovascular markers so they
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had lower systolic blood pressure and so
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it just goes to show not that there is
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not that the sodium bicarbonate it's not
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something that's used and wrong and that
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you shouldn't be doing but everyone can
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and should be working to have more
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fruits and veggies in their diet because
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of either the capacity to help treat
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metabolic acidosis or to help prevent
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metabolic metabolic acidosis in people
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with kidney disease so
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um so knowing that I mean again everyone
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that's right we're so like fruits and
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veggies fruits and veggies but sodium
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bicarbonate can you explain then what is
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that right how does that work and then
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um I well then we'll get into kind of
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that the household remedy that people
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want to try to just drink in place of it
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basically sodium bicarbonate is nothing
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more than Salt and baking soda that's
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probably the simplest explanation and it
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comes as pills which is kind of hard to
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swallow but it comes as pills it comes
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as liquid and you can take both of them
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if that's something that your
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nephrologist is asking but you have to
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understand what is the effects but more
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importantly what is the side effects of
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what's going to happen when you end up
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taking these
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so can someone then like let's just say
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someone has kidney disease and they
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don't want to eat fruits and veggies can
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they just drink baking soda yeah it's a
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terrible terrible idea so hear me out
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whenever you you hear somebody on the
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internet trying to tell you like you
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know take this concoction and it's going
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to fix your kidney disease please don't
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unless you fully understand it you know
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it's it's um in my world right now with
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weight loss medications everybody wants
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Rosenberg
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Etc it's the same exact thing is nobody
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wants to understand the full scope so I
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said the most important thing in sodium
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bicarbonate is the sodium part and why
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should you care because as you start to
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put too much salt if you put too much
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salt and your body can't manage the
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levels inside your blood you can
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actually get seizures from it and so too
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little salt can give you seizures coma
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and death too much salt can give you
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seizures coma and death so this is not a
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minor thing you can get nausea and
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vomiting from it you can get muscle pain
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from it you can have stuff like where
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you have to pee all the time you can
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start to build up fluid if you have any
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heart issues and the heart can't pump
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well enough the salt is like a magnet
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for water so it's holding on to water
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now you have all this extra volume that
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your heart has to try to squeeze if it
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can't the blood will back up work it
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will back up into your lungs we call
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that pulmonary edema and on top of all
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of these things the bicarbonate portion
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if you're not under the guidance of a
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healthcare practitioner who's monitoring
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your blood work you can go from the
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acidosa side too much too much of the
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alkalosa side and once again seizures
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comment that from the salt component but
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metabolic alkalosis in itself can
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actually cause your heart to slow down
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it can cause you to slow down your
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breathing going on because the concept
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there is is if your alkalosis meaning
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too much alkaline in your body what does
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your lungs try to do counteract that so
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let's think about this for a second when
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there's too much acid we said the lungs
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breathe faster to blow off the acid in
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the lungs if there's too much alkaline
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in the body the lungs don't want to
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breathe fast they want to slow down
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their breathing so that they can hold on
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to the acid to counteract the alkaline
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so what happens breathing can become
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incredibly slow so this is why it's not
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a simple answer is why don't you just
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take that step a much better answer is
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the one that Michelle just talked about
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which is why don't you eat more fruits
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and vegetables the data shows that
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you're going to get exactly the same
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benefits from a diet that's
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predominantly
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plant-based as you are we're taking salt
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and baking soda so if that's the case
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and then you're going to get the
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antioxidants you're going to get the
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fiber you're going to get the water
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that's packaged perfectly inside the
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fruit and vegetables why the heck
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wouldn't you take Nature's best medicine
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instead of just me giving you some salt
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and baking soda
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yep great question and
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um and again we're not saying if you're
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prescribed that like not to do that by
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any means but it's where again
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prevention and being proactive are
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things that were always we're always
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preaching so hopefully that answers your
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guys question a little bit on metabolic
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acidosis uh so
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um sodium bicarbonate baking soda and
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eating more fruits and veggies we'll see
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you guys next time thanks guys
