Baking soda also known as sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3) has some amazing medicinal uses and benefits. In fact, it can be rated as a miracle medicine in the same league or ahead of the pharmaceutical industry’s top rated remedies. It is up there with its equally humble companion hydrogen peroxide as one of the most inexpensive and safe health remedies available. It makes sense to stock up with and learn all you can about the many uses of baking soda.
Fighting Colds and Flus
It’s commonly known for its alkalinizing, antacid and electrolyte replacement properties. When taken internally, baking soda is thought to raise the pH of your blood. This is the basis for its recommended use in fighting colds and influenza symptoms.
Pregnancy Benefits
Studies have shown that drinking a solution of baking soda in water can be helpful for pregnant women experiencing a slow or difficult labour and can help to avoid C-sections in about 20% of cases because it neutralizes acid in the womb.
Immune Booster
U.S. National Institutes of Health funded research suggests that baking soda primes your immune system against inflammation and consequently may be a safe and effective treatment adjunct for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and other autoimmune diseases. Their data suggests that drinking baking soda-infused water is effective in activating an anti-inflammatory pathway mediated by a neuronal-like function of mesothelial cells in the lining of your internal organs.
Soda Doping
Baking soda may enhance sports performance with a strategy known as ‘soda doping’ because of its ability to reduce inflammation. Long-distance runners have also engaged in a practice known as “soda doping”. Baking soda capsules taken before a race is said to enhance performance in a manner similar to carbohydrate loading. Increasing your bloods pH is said to offset muscle acidity production during heightened activity. Baking soda use has also been shown to improve swimmers speeds.
Baking Soda for kidney Disease
Baking soda is a beneficial treatment for chronic kidney disease because of its interaction with mesothelial cells that are found in your blood and kidneys. Baking Sodas kidney benefits led researchers to explore the mechanisms of its benefits for renal function, and its slowing of the progression of kidney disease. This investigation noticed that baking soda shifted the balance of immune cells in the kidneys, boosting anti-inflammatory immune cells while simultaneously decreasing inflammatory cells. Additional tests revealed that baking soda has the same anti-inflammatory effect on blood and spleen as well.
How does it work? Mesothelial cells, which line your internal organs, communicate with the organ in question via microvilli that emit a neurotransmitter called acetylcholine, and this appears to be an important part of the equation. This led to the realization that the inflammatory response is being mediated via acetylcholine signals through the microvilli connecting the mesothelial cells and the organ they line. The anti-inflammatory response triggered by drinking baking soda-infused water was found to continue for a minimum of four hours. As explained by the authors:
“Following oral NaHCO3 loading, macrophage polarization was shifted from predominantly M1 (inflammatory) to M2 (regulatory) phenotypes, and FOXP3+CD4+ T-lymphocytes increased in the spleen, blood, and kidneys of rats. Similar anti-inflammatory changes in macrophage polarization were observed in the blood of human subjects …
Our data indicate that oral NaHCO3 activates a splenic anti-inflammatory pathway and provides evidence that the signals that mediate this response are transmitted to the spleen via a novel neuronal-like function of mesothelial cells.”
The Common Sense Method
All that medical techno-babble is a complicated way of saying or admitting that Baking Soda is a miracle medicine. The old people could have told them that without all the fuss. Their methodology consists of common sense and empirical evidence.