Old pantry staple is new again with people using it to improve fitness, disease and more. But it has risks
Old pantry staple is new again with people using it to improve fitness, disease and more. But it has risks
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You may think the baking soda lurking in the back of your cupboard is only useful for absorbing gross refrigerator smells, cleaning produce or making baked goods.
But some people would probably recommend you think again — because they’re adding it to their water and sharing online that they’ve found the ingredient improves their exercise performance, acid reflux, energy levels and more. But experts said whether the practice is helpful for various conditions is a nuanced matter due to limited and mixed research, risks and personal health.
“Baking soda is a very cool natural ingredient that can do a lot,” said Frances Largeman-Roth, a registered dietitian nutritionist and author of “Everyday Snack Tray.”
“It can (also) neutralize odors and help you remove stains from your clothes,” Largeman-Roth said via email.
However, just because baking soda is produced from natural ingredients doesn’t mean it’s safe to ingest without regulation, she added. The need for caution is due to the chemistry of baking soda and that of the body, and how the sensitive interplay between the two is the very thing that could help or harm.
Baking soda, formally known as sodium bicarbonate, is an alkaline substance composed of sodium, hydrogen, carbon and oxygen, said Grace Derocha, a registered dietitian nutritionist and spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. The primary way baking soda could be helpful for issues such as acid reflux is by neutralizing acid.
On the pH scale of acidity and alkalinity, anything with a pH of less than 7 is acidic, while 7 to 8 is neutral and anything from 8 to 14 is alkaline, or basic. The normal pH range for the human body, measured by blood, is 7.35 to 7.45, Derocha said, but specific body parts and substances have their own pH — such as the stomach’s highly acidic pH of 1.
Consuming too much baking soda, which has an alkaline pH of about 8.3, is when things can get thrown out of whack. Based on this science, here’s what the research and адвокат по экономическим преступлениям в москве experts say about the health effects, important risk factors and other things you need to know.
What the research does (and doesn’t) show
When it comes to what consuming baking soda could improve, exercise endurance is one of the purposes most backed up by research, dating to the 1980s — though some studies are small or have mixed conclusions.
During exercise — particularly the intense, anaerobic kind such as sprinting or jumping rope — muscle metabolism produces hydrogen ions, said exercise physiologist Dr. Tamara Hew-Butler, an associate professor of exercise and sport science at Wayne State University in Detroit, via email. Then the breakdown of muscle glycogen that produces energy also results in the making of lactate plus a hydrogen ion.
The ion buildup “increases the acidity … in the blood/muscle environment that limits exercise performance (i.e., the ‘burn’ of exercise),” Hew-Butler added. “Thus, the (benefit) of ingesting baking soda before exercise is to reduce the acidity in and around the working muscles, which can improve performance in short-duration, high-intensity exercise.”
Some studies have shown that ingesting baking soda an hour or two before exercise can improve performance during up to 12 minutes of high-intensity activities such as cycling, running, rowing, boxing and karate, according to a large 2021 research review by the International Society of Sports Nutrition. But it’s possible for the effects on pH to last up to three hours, Hew-Butler said.
Participants who consumed baking soda in a study involving strength training were able to do more reps with less muscle fatigue than the placebo group.
Baking soda may lower stomach acid and relieve acid reflux or indigestion, too — which is unsurprising since the ingredient is a component of antacids, a common treatment for the conditions, Derocha said.
There has also been some evidence to suggest baking soda may also slow the progression of kidney disease.
In people with chronic kidney disease, the organs don’t function well enough to get rid of enough acid each day, resulting in more acidic blood, said Dr. Paul O’Connor, professor of physiology at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University in Georgia.