Cutting salt intake may lower night-time toilet trips

Tokyo, March 26  

Lowering salt intake can significantly reduce excessive night time toilet trips, a condition which is also known as nocturia, a new study has found.

For the study, 223 volunteers were asked to cut their salt by 25 per cent, from 10.7 grammes to 8 grammes per day, their average night time toilet expeditions fell from an average of 2.3 trips to 1.4 times.

In contrast, when 98 subjects increased their intake from 9.9 to 11g they found that their need to urinate increased from 2.3 times to 2.7 times every night.

“This is the first study to measure how salt intake affects the frequency of going to the bathroom,” said Matsuo Tomohiro, of Nagasaki University in Japan.

“Night time urination is a real problem for many people, especially as they get older,” said Tomohiro.

“This work holds out the possibility that a simply dietary modification might significantly improve the quality of life for many people,” he said.

This reduction in the need to go to the bathroom at night also caused a marked improvement in the quality of life of the participants, ‘The Telegraph’ reported.

Salt can only be disposed from the body when it is dissolved, so the more people eat the more urine needs to be expelled to get rid of it, researchers said.

Salty foods also make people more thirsty, so the double impact of salt and more liquid increases the need to urinate, particularly at night. — PTI