Sports Drink - Reducing Risk of Water Intoxication

Reducing Risk of Water Intoxication

Water is the best beverage for simply rehydrating. However during exercise or just being outside on a hot day electrolytes are also lost. Consumption of excessive amounts of water can cause water intoxication, a potentially fatal imbalance of electrolytes in the body. Water intoxication is extremely rare. It might occur, for example, during intense exercise when heavy sweating removes water and electrolytes from the body, but only large quantities of water are consumed to replace what has been lost. The resulting low concentration of electrolytes adversely affects central nervous system function.

Many sports drinks reduce the risk of water intoxication by replenishing fluids and electrolytes in a ratio similar to that normally found in the human body. However, some sports drinks have low concentrations of electrolytes, so overconsumption of them could still lead to water intoxication. People whose work or exercise puts them at high risk of developing heat illness or water intoxication should seek professional advice about proper rehydration of the body.

Read more about this topic:  Sports Drink

Famous quotes containing the words reducing, risk, water and/or intoxication:

    [The Republicans] offer ... a detailed agenda for national renewal.... [On] reducing illegitimacy ... the state will use ... funds for programs to reduce out-of-wedlock pregnancies, to promote adoption, to establish and operate children’s group homes, to establish and operate residential group homes for unwed mothers, or for any purpose the state deems appropriate. None of the taxpayer funds may be used for abortion services or abortion counseling.
    Newt Gingrich (b. 1943)

    The married are those who have taken the terrible risk of intimacy and, having taken it, know life without intimacy to be impossible.
    Carolyn Heilbrun (b. 1926)

    Not all the water in the rough rude sea
    Can wash the balm off from an anointed king;
    The breath of worldly men cannot depose
    The deputy elected by the Lord.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

    Perhaps there are only a few women who experience without deception the overwhelming intoxication of the senses which they expect from their encounters with men, which they feel bound to expect because of the fuss made about it in novels, written by men.
    Max Frisch (1911–1991)