Tag: health and wellness

3 Surprising health benefits from water

Water does a lot of work behind the scenes, beyond quenching our thirst. H2O is an integral part of our lives with more than half of our body made up of it and with our body constantly craving water in our diets.

While we know that we need water to prevent dehydration, it helps our body in many ways that many people might not realize.

Read on about all the other amazing ways water assists our body’s functionality and this might encourage you to reach for another glass from your water cooler!

Healthy skin

If your skin’s radiance and elasticity is important to you, then you’ll be glad to hear that water is a simple solution to help maintain its appearance. Thirty per cent of your skin is made up of water and by regularly replenishing your body’s water balance, you’re also improving your skin’s thickness and density. Since your skin is an organ, which is made up of cells, these cells need water to function. If it doesn’t receive enough, your skin will become dry and flaky, which is also more likely to wrinkle.

If you have acne, it’s been reported that drinking enough water helps clear your skin overtime, but don’t expect results overnight.

Healthy skin goes beyond appearances and your epidermis helps protect your body’s organs and tissues from harm’s way. But since water reaches your skin last, you should use other moisturizers right after a bath or shower to keep your skin well hydrated.

Weight loss

Obesity is a worldwide epidemic with many people around the world diagnosed with underlying conditions caused by obesity. Water can help you in your quest to lose weight since it’s an inexpensive beverage that has no calories, but is still able to keep you satiated. Within an hour of drinking a glass of water, your body’s metabolism produces more heat and you expel more calories. (Also, by refilling your water bottle, you’re reducing your environmental footprint.)

A study in Germany found that if water’s importance was taught at schools and filtered water was available to children, they increased their water intake by 220 mL per day, which also reduced the risk of obesity by 31 per cent. The year-long study showed that it’s crucial for water to be offered at schools as a healthy habit for children to adopt when they’re younger.

Shock absorption

When you go running and your feet hit the pavement, your body functions in a way that absorbs the impact of the force. This is done with the help your cartilage, which is primarily made up of water and proteins that are found at the end of your bones. When your joints move, your cartilage adapts its shape, reduces the friction and absorbs the impact, which can only be done properly due to its high water content. When you’re younger, your cartilage is made up of about 85 per cent water and as you age, this can drop down to about 70 per cent. If your cartilage has lost most of its water content, your joints can absorb less shock and this can lead to conditions such as osteoarthritis. Once your body loses the molecules which keeps a high volume of water within the cartilage, the water can’t be replenished once it’s lost.

How to convince your kids to drink more water

Water will always be an important part of our lives, no matter how old or young you are. Just as you would encourage a child to start reading when they’re young to help their literacy, you’ll want to encourage them to reach for a glass of water to quench their thirst so they stay healthy and hydrated.

Children’s bodies function differently than adults’ and since their body weight is much less, they retain less water.

A study found that many children (84 per cent) were mildly dehydrated at the start of a school day. Children who drank water during the day performed better on evaluations testing their ability to recognize the relationship between words, while those who didn’t, had trouble remembering the numbers they heard. The study analyzed the drinking water habits of 168 children between the age of 9 to 11 to see how dehydration affected their vigor and fatigue levels.

Mild dehydration alters our brain’s structure and functionality, which can impair our ability to concentrate, stay alert, do arithmetic and retain short-term memories. But these changes aren’t permanent and once your thirst is satisfied, your brain will return to normal functionality.

We know H2O offers great benefits, but a challenge faced by many parents is convincing their kids to pick up a glass of water when they’re thirsty.

Children between the ages of one to three years old should be drinking 1.3 litres of water each day and this should increase to 1.7 litres when they’re four to eight years old, according to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies. As they grow older, children should be drinking more water. Girls between the ages of 9 to 13 should drink 2.1 litres each day and boys of that age should drink 2.4 litres each day.

We scoured for some great tips and tricks parents have taken on:

Make drinking water cool. Put on your creative hat to think of ideas that help your child enjoy drinking water. Don’t underestimate adding a small decoration to their drinking, such as crazy straws, quirky cups, neat ice cubes or innovative water cooler machines. Let them decorate their own one-of-a-kind water bottles that they can show off while on the go, which makes kids excited to use them. Dressing up water in a different way every time can help your child warm up to the idea of reaching for a glass of H2O, despite its “boring” taste.

Explain why it’s good. Help your young ones understand the importance of H2O in their lives. Explain to them how not enough water in their bodies can affect their day-to-day and books can help illustrate and demonstrate how our bodies rely on water.

Water makes up more than 50 per cent of our bodies, but it makes up a greater percentage when you’re younger. As a baby, water makes up 78 per cent of your body, but within a year, this drops down to 65 per cent, according to a professor of pediatric neuroscience at Allegheny University.

By showing your kids how to easily fill up their water bottles, you can also sneak in some good lessons about the importance of practicing green habits and how their actions affect the environment.

Make it easy to access. Parents aren’t around to watch their children all the time, which is why it’s important that if children are feeling thirsty, they know where they can find drinking water. Make sure your children know where their cups or water bottles are stored, but also encourage them to tell you or their caregiver when they’re thirsty, especially on warm and humid days. If they are too young to get hot water by themselves, make sure there’s a system in place. Also, whenever they’re out and about, keep water on hand so they become accustomed to taking small sips throughout the day.

Slowly introduce them to the change. It’s the same with breaking any bad habit, whether it’s trying to eat healthier or stop smoking, going cold turkey doesn’t go over well for most people. In many cases, this has the opposite effect. If you want your kids to drink water more frequently, the solution isn’t to pour it down their throats and ban other beverage options; you need to have them slowly switch habits on their own so it sticks, even when you’re not around.

For example, if your children have become accustomed to having juice and pop available at meal times, on a few days a week, have water as the only beverage option at the dinner table. Once your kids become accustomed to this, turn water into the primary drink of choice and make other beverages an occasional treat. Also, you can lead by example and when your kids see mommy and daddy always drinking water, they’ll want to too. By refilling water bottles with a water cooler, you’ll also save yourself money with this change.

Avoid constipation during pregnancy

(Photo credit: Bayu Aditya/Creative Commons)

No one enjoys the feeling of constipation. It’s downright unpleasant to face a difficult and painful time when you’re using the washroom.

If you’ve had the good fortune of never experiencing constipation, consider yourself lucky. Constipation is when it’s difficult to empty your bowels or you pass hard painful stool when you do. Many Canadians, both young and old, suffer from this condition with one in four Canadians experiencing symptoms.

Pregnant women face many changes to their body during pregnancy, but they also have a higher chance (11-38%) of experiencing constipation.

During pregnancy, the body adapts to a growing baby by having your intestines absorb more water, which causes the stool to dry out, and releasing higher levels of progesterone and lower levels of the hormone motilin, which leads to food taking longer to pass through the digestive system. Combined with pregnant mothers resting more frequently and taking more vitamin supplements, the likelihood of constipation increases.

Water is usually a simple solution to relieve expectant mothers from the pain and annoyance of constipation, but it also helps them avoid it too.

Mothers to be should be drinking 2.3 litres of water a day. This will help pass more urine through their bodies and loosen up the stool in their systems, which means they’ll use the washroom more frequently and with less stool each time.

But that’s not the only way to banish discomfort the next time you go to the washroom.

You are what you eat. Indulging in a high fibre diet is just what you need to stop constipation in its tracks and women should be eating 25 to 30 grams of dietary fibre each day. Whole grain and whole wheat foods are great sources of fibre, along with vegetables, fruits and legumes. If you enjoy prunes, you might be surprised to hear that they’re a well-known remedy thanks to their laxative qualities from the fibre and sorbitol, an alcohol sugar.

Go when you need to. You may have picked up the habit of ignoring the urge to use the washroom when it’s inconvenient, but it can lead to constipation in the long run. When you hold it in, you are creating a backlog in your bowel that could have trouble passing through the next time you use the toilet. Going to the bathroom shouldn’t be a painful or rushed process.

Keep your body moving. Exercise gets the blood flowing, the heart pumping and helps move food through your digestive tract. Sitting for long periods of time is the new smoking and adults should be doing some moderate exercise, whether it’s swimming or walking, at least three times a week for 20 to 30 minutes. You’ll feel happier too thanks to the endorphins being released.

Redistribute your supplements. Instead of taking a large dose of calcium or iron at one time, split it into smaller doses. Your bowel movements will thank you for that.

As a future mother, you have enough on your plate. Don’t let dealing with constipation slow you down – simply make sure you have a convenient and inexpensive water cooler solution nearby.

Exercise: How much water should you drink?

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Want to pump more weights, run a longer distance or be a better soccer player?

“Practice makes perfect” is one of the best pieces of advice out there for anyone looking to improve their performance, but there’s another habit that all athletes follow – drinking cold water while exercising. It’s simple advice that’s sometimes forgotten.

The warmth you feel while working out is your body working harder, which raises your core body temperature above its normal 37°C. To regulate your body temperature, you sweat. But when you sweat profusely, your body sheds water and electrolytes and once you lose more than two per cent of your body weight, you’re dehydrated and your performance takes a hit.

The warmer your body temperature, the harder it is to focus and combat fatigue. Ignoring the symptoms can result in heat stroke, which is more likely if you’re exercising on a hot day or in a humid environment.

One study discovered that taking sips of cold water before and after your workout improves your endurance by about 23 per cent since less heat accumulates in your body. If you’ve watched the Olympics, you know how much of a difference one or two seconds can make in speed skating event, a 100-kilometre race or a hockey game.

Like many things, moderation is key. Drink too much and your stomach cramps. Drink too little and your body loses its ability to function properly.

The amount of water you drink varies based on many different factors, such as how much a person sweats and how much electrolytes they’ve lost, the type of exercise, the length of exercise time, the weather, the equipment used, metabolism and heat acclimatization.

According to the American College of Sports Medicine, if a 154 pound (70 kg) person does moderate exercise, such as a brisk walk or slow jog, they should drink about 0.6 litres of water per hour.

If you take it up a notch with high intensity exercise, you’ll need to monitor your fluid intake before, during and after your exercise.

Pre-workout: You should be drinking liquids hours before you lift your first dumbbell since this helps your body absorb fluids and retain normal urine levels. Don’t feel thirsty? Eat a small meal or salty snack to encourage your thirst.

How much water should you drink? Before exercising, drink five to ten millilitres (mL) of water for one kilogram of your body weight. This means someone who’s 154 pounds should drink 350 to 700 mL at least four hours before working out.

During workout: Each person loses water at a different rate. To figure out the amount of water you should be drinking, weigh yourself before and after you exercise and replenish your body’s fluids with drinks packed with electrolytes. Carbohydrates will also help balance your electrolytes and boost your performance.

How much water should you drink? Drink six to twelve mL of liquids for one kilogram of your body weight for each hour of exercise. A 154-pound person should drink 400 to 800 mL per hour, which is about three to four servings.

Post-workout: Restore your body’s hydration faster by ingesting drinks and snacks with sodium.

How much water should you drink? For every one kilogram of body mass lost after exercising, drink 1.5 litres of fluid, unless you’ve been working out for hours and replenishing your fluids at the same time.

Don’t worry about having enough hot or cold water stored away with the right water cooler solution. You’ll be saving money and helping the environment too by regularly refilling your water bottle.

What’s in your ice cubes?

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Most of us have been there. It’s been a long day at work and you’re finally on your way home. You’re on the train or the bus, it’s roasting hot and you’re thirsty. Parched, even. And, your water bottle has run dry.

You peer around, hoping that some kind passenger has a spare water bottle, or maybe you happen to be on a train with dining service, but to no such luck. As a commuter, you’re left with two choices, ride it out or get off the bus. So you sit there and suffer.

Considering any and all possibilities, it occurs to you for a brief moment that just down the aisle, in the public washroom, there is water flowing freely from the tap. You could just walk into the washroom, turn on the tap and fill your bottle. But would you?

Likely not.

In Canada, we have come to expect clean, safe drinking water. And yet there remains one public space, used by millions of Canadians everyday, that has fallen behind the times in its water safety regulations.

Despite the many advances in water filtering and purification, the federal regulations governing water quality on public transportation have remained sadly behind the times. To be exact, they haven’t been updated since 1954; that’s 60 years.

To put it into perspective, the first mass vaccination of children against polio was in 1954. Yes, polio.

It was also the year the first Burger King opened, the first commercial transistor radio was sold, and, perhaps most significantly, the year Godzilla first terrified Japanese audiences from the silver screen.

The point is that this was a long time ago and, needless to say, our scientific standards for water quality and the technology to filter and purify it have improved a great deal over the past 60-years.

There’s no excuse today for us to be subjected to 1954 water quality standards.

Fortunately, efforts are underway by the federal government to update the Potable Water Regulations for Common Carriers (PWRCC), which governs the quality of water provided on public transportation, including drinking water on buses, trains, airplanes and water vessels.

That doesn’t just mean the water for washing your hands at the back of the GO Bus. It also includes water used in your ice cubes during a flight or to prepare your food in the train dining car. Pretty important stuff.

The Public Health Agency of Canada is modernizing the PWRCC with more rigorous regulations in the areas of quality control, sampling, testing and record keeping. Testing of water samples, for example, will occur more regularly and records will be kept for a period of three years.

With these new reforms, Health Canada and companies that operate public transportation systems will have a more accurate picture of their overall performance in maintaining a high level of water quality.

We’re glad to see this step being taken.

With today’s technology, there’s no reason we can’t have clean, pure water in all of our public places, as well as in the transportation methods we use to get to them.

A Strauss WaterBar could easily connect into your train’s water system, cleaning the water of 99.9% of the microorganisms and bacteria in it, as well as removing the taste of chlorine. The result: a clean and crisp tasting glass of water with no harmful contaminants.

Unfortunately, the PWRCC won’t come into effect until at least 2015. So, in the meantime, make sure to bring your refillable bottled water with you on your commute and maybe avoid those ice cubes on your plane.