What your hair can tell you about your kidneys

Clinical nutritionist Sona says the quality of your hair and swollen feet can provide a window into the health of your kidneys. PHOTO| FILE

What you need to know:

  • When hair starts falling out, as it did for Salome twelve years ago, it reflects weak kidney qi or life force (dry, split, thinning, or hair that greys too early indicates the same).

  • Think about this life force as the batteries that run the kidneys. In short, they’re run down and the hair loss simply is outward sign. Another outward sign was the swelling in Salome’s feet.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if there were a way to look into the future? Well it appears as far as our health is concerned, signs do often exist; it’s just that we don’t know how to interpret them.

Salome, 34, lost her kidney to cancer a few years ago. Whenever I see cancer, I always wonder whether it could’ve been caught earlier and whether there were signs. After all, cancer doesn’t grow overnight.

That’s why I found her other health complaint, hair loss, hugely interesting. In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), the quality of our hair is very closely connected to our kidneys.

When hair starts falling out, as it did for Salome twelve years ago, it reflects weak kidney qi or life force (dry, split, thinning, or hair that greys too early indicates the same).

Think about this life force as the batteries that run the kidneys. In short, they’re run down and the hair loss simply is outward sign. Another outward sign was the swelling in Salome’s feet.

When our kidneys aren’t functioning as they should, excess water and sodium don’t get excreted and start building up in the tissues. This accumulation of fluid is called oedema and is most noticeable in the ankles and feet (due to gravity) but can also occur in other areas too.

LOWERING BLOOD PRESSURE

It was the swelling that caused Salome’s doctor to send her for tests that led to the eventual diagnosis of cancer. Clearly for Salome, my analysis is all a moot point, but for you or a loved one, it might not be too late.

For Salome, the important thing was now to look after her remaining kidney and to keep her blood pressure from getting too high. You see, there is a very delicate hormone system in the body that regulates blood pressure and fluid balance and it depends very much on the kidneys.

If the remaining kidney isn’t functioning as efficiently as it should, her blood pressure could go up. In fact, this is exactly what had happened and explained why she was on blood pressure medication at the time of seeing me.

So which foods are best for lowering blood pressure? Bananas score highly here. As a 1999 study demonstrated, blood pressure fell by 10% in people who ate two bananas daily for a week. Bananas are rich in potassium, a mineral that works with sodium to help regulate fluid balance, and therefore blood pressure (you also need to reduce salt intake). Another useful food is potassium-rich celery, either juiced or in salads.

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