Kidney Disease 97
In all three cases, vitamin E brought back much of the nephrons’ fi lter-
ing function.
Kidneys and Water Consumption
One of the kidneys’ tasks is to regulate the concentration of salts in the
body. When the kidneys’ management of salt metabolism is normal,
each atom of sodium picks up twenty-one molecules of water, which is
excreted from the body as urine. The fact that urine enters the bladder
from the kidneys drop by drop gives an indication of how slowly the
kidneys fi lter water and waste products out of the blood. When water
is gulped down so fast that it pours into the digestive tract like water
from a faucet turned on full, it stretches the walls of the capillaries in
the nephrons to the breaking point. The best way to synchronize
drinking water with the rate at which the kidneys process it is to sip it
slowly. You can satisfy a great part of your water requirements by eating
the raw vegetables and fruit that have the highest percentage of water,
such as tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, and oranges. The much slower
process of eating as opposed to drinking ensures that the amount of
water ingested at any given time won’t be more than the kidneys can
fi lter out of the blood in the same amount of time.
MALCOLM: ONE STEP AWAY FROM DIALYSIS
Malcolm had been on diuretics to lower his high blood pressure
for more than twenty years. From the time I made his
acquaintance, fi ve years ago, he looked haggard with huge bags
under his eyes, the latter often a sign of poor kidney function. He
came up to me recently at a meeting and told me he had kidney
failure. He asked if I had any suggestions. His was the classic case
of kidney failure caused by the high blood pressure medication he
had been taking for so long. On questioning him further he told
me that 30 percent of his nephrons (fi lters) were still working but
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