No Salt Diet - Is Salt Really the Villain?

I have tried cutting out salt, but the resulting no salt diet didn't seem to do anything for me.

My normal blood pressure varies so much that I'm sure other factors mask the effect of salt, if there is any.

The amount of salt I eat varies greatly, too, so who's to say?

I would need to eat measured amounts of salt, give enough time to let any change settle in, then measure my blood pressure over weeks for each salt amount.

Then, maybe I'd see the effect.

Food scientists haven't given us much help here. They are confused why some people are sensitive to salt while others aren't, and why some people have lower blood pressure when they eat more salt!

So much for salt and high blood pressure for those who can eat all the salt they want. You won't see them on a no salt diet. (We'll see later why they might still want to.)

Overall, it's easier on the experts to say everyone should reduce salt intake. Let's see what they recommend.

The typical American takes in a daily dose of 3,000 milligrams of sodium.

The experts say that's too much. All we need are 1,500 to 2,300 milligrams.

Now, these recommendations are nowhere near a salt free diet.

So, unless you are super sensitive to salt, you may not need a complete no salt diet.

Good news, if you like some salt.

The advice above is based on some experiments, so let's take a look at their results.

A 2001 study in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine showed that people on a low sodium diet that also included plenty of fruits and vegetables had the largest drop in blood pressure of any of the other five groups tested.

The six groups were low sodium with no other diet change, low sodium with plenty of fruits and vegetables, medium sodium with same diet breakdown, and higher sodium with same diet breakdown.

So here on the average, we seem to have a relationship between salt and hypertension, but the conclusion is complicated by the fruits and vegetables effect.

Another complication is the relationship between salt and high blood pressure compared to salt and normal blood pressure.

A rough estimate supported by some researchers is that 26 percent of normal blood pressure people are salt sensitive while 58 percent of those with high blood pressure are salt sensitive.

In another well known study involving 708 people, salt sensitivity was found to be the common factor in death from heart disease. Whether the people had hypertension or not didn't seem to matter.

What can we conclude about the salt free diet then?

Conclusions about the effects of salt.

1. Salt can cause increased blood pressure in some people, but not others.
2. Salt is probably not the most important factor in a high blood pressure diet.
3. Excess salt is not heart healthy for other reasons than blood pressure.

So, you may not need a no salt diet unless you are one of the 58 percent of hypertensives sensitive to salt.

But if you are a heavy salt user, you should cut down.

If you don't want to cut down, at least run an experiment on yourself with and without salt and high sodium foods. See my suggestions at the top for how to conduct this experiment.

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