Electrolytes are what you crave: sodium vs potassium

?In the cult classic “Idiocracy” the population loves “Brawndo: The Thirst Mutilator” because it has electrolytes.?The main character simply asks, “what are electrolytes?”, to which the stupefied members of the president’s cabinet can only simply respond with “it’s what plants crave,” from the decades of advertising for the product in the movie.?

In today’s world electrolytes are becoming more and more of a focus for hydration and performance, but what are electrolytes, what do they do, and how much do we need?

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Strictly speaking, electrolytes are charged ions in solution.?These can be positively charged ions (sodium, potassium, magnesium, and calcium) or negatively charged (chloride, phosphate, bicarbonate).?From a biological perspective, when we talk about electrolytes we are really talking about sodium and potassium, the two main electrolytes in the body that are do not have ready stores such as calcium.?????

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Sodium and potassium work together for nerve signaling, muscle contraction, and even blood pressure.?The ratio of these ions is very important, and the amount of each ion is dictated by the kidney.

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How much you need

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The dietary recommendation for potassium is 4700 mg per day.?There is no established upper limit, so this should be the lower end of the targeted consumption per day.?This amount has been shown to be the daily consumption needed to lower blood pressure. ?

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On the other hand, sodium has an established upper limit of 2300 mg per day.?Consumption above this level is associated with increased blood pressure, kidney stones, and impeded lung function during exercise.?For those with increased risk of cardiovascular disease, the recommendation is less than 1500 mg of sodium consumed per day.

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How much potassium do Americans consume?

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Americans overconsume sodium with an average consumption of 3500 mg per day while significantly under consuming potassium at an average of 2600 mg consumed per day according to the 2015-2016 NHANES study.

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The ratio of sodium and potassium consumption is critically important.?Obligatory losses, or losses under starvation conditions, is just under 200 mg per day for sodium and just over 600 mg per day for potassium.?This would suggest that there should be at least 3 parts potassium consumed for every 1 parts sodium.?This observation is also supported by similar cardiovascular issues in the German population.?Germans consume more potassium, about 4000 mg per day, but also consume more sodium at about 10,000 mg per day.?Even though there is increased potassium consumption, the benefits are masked by the much higher sodium consumption.

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To make matters more glaring, increased sodium consumption increases the rate of potassium loss as the kidneys make urine to remove excess sodium.?

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Thus, increasing potassium consumption to be greater than sodium consumption is needed to fully realize the many benefits of proper electrolyte nutritional benefits.

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Impact of high sodium consumption

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The most well documented issue arising from high sodium consumption, which is considered above 2300 mg per day, is high blood pressure.?The correlation between high sodium and high blood pressure is well established, but this is not the only negative consequence of high sodium consumption.?

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High sodium consumption has been shown to increase the stiffness of blood vessels, even in the absence of increased blood pressure.?Conversely, lowering sodium intake increases the flexibility of blood vessels enhancing vascular performance.

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High sodium has been shown to increase the heart wall thickness of the left ventricle of the heart, which decreases the amount of blood the heart is able to pump.

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The kidneys are adversely affected by high sodium consumption as renal function generally decreases with corresponding increases in the amount of protein in urine, which is largely independent of the increased blood pressure common with high sodium diets.?In other words, high blood pressure is not necessary for kidney damage due to high sodium consumption.

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Even the brain is adversely affected by high sodium consumption as there is greater risk of developing neurodegenerative diseases.?Brain function impairment from high sodium diets isn’t just limited to neurodegenerative disease, but also impairs learning and memory in animal models.?New research suggests that this is caused by large immune system alterations in the gut commonly found with too much sodium in the diet.?Hence, diets too high in sodium may not only have long term adverse effects for the development of neurodegenerative disease but may also negatively affect learning and memory in younger individuals.

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The good news is that some of these detrimental effects can be reversed over time by simply lowing sodium consumption.

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Does high sodium improve athletic performance?

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When considering athletic performance, it is important to keep in mind that there are a multitude of factors involved from diet to training to acclimatization to the environment.

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High sodium intake leads to higher blood pressure, meaning that the heart requires more energy to pump blood through the body.?This means that there is less energy available for exertion, decreasing endurance in increasing the time needed for recovery.?However, the exact impact of high sodium consumption has not been adequately studied.

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Studies comparing low and moderate sodium consumption showed no difference in athletic ability, but the amount of sodium in sweat changes.?Hence, high sodium consumption is certainly not beneficial for athletic performance and may actually be detrimental.

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Sodium, but not potassium, loss in sweat is variable

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Contrary to popular belief, the sodium in sweat is variable and depends on sodium consumption.?Potassium, on the other hand, is a constant and is needed for sweat secretion while sodium is not.?

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First published in 1949, fit young men living in tropical conditions had no change in athletic performance when their diet changed from 6 g sodium per day to 1 g sodium per day.?The only change was the amount of sodium in their sweat and urine.?This observation has been repeated in multiple studies since.?Therefore, the idea of replacing what is lost in sweat is a misnomer as the amount of sodium lost in sweat is directly linked to the amount of sodium consumed.?Higher sodium had harmful effects on the cardiovascular system while having no impact on athletic performance.

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Potassium content in sweat does not change and the loss is much higher than is commonly known.?Even low activity in hot conditions the average potassium loss is 4500 mg, and high activity, such as US Army basic training, has been measured at an average of 5600 mg potassium loss per day regardless of changes in dietary potassium intake.?Loss of potassium, not sodium, results in severely impaired athletic ability and adverse effects such as cramps and rhabdomyolysis.

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Benefits of high potassium for athletic performance

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Most athletes are not consuming enough potassium on a daily basis and consume too much sodium.?The adverse effects of low potassium consumption have been widely showed in military personnel.?

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Observations during World War 2 by the British in present-day Iraq showed heat illness causes insatiable thirst and tremendous urine production of over 2.5 liters (or a half gallon) per day.?Later it was found that the heat illness was caused by chronically low potassium for these particular soldiers.?

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During the Vietnam War, the US Army investigated heat injury in otherwise fit men.?They found that heat injury was largely caused by a large loss of potassium, especially when training in the heat.?This correlated with signs of muscle cell death, also called rhabdomyolysis.

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Further studies showed that low potassium in muscles causes a plethora of negative consequences for athletic performance.?

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The most notable and harmful is a significant reduction in blood flow.?Normal tissue has a 400% increase in blood flow when exercising, while muscles that are low in potassium, 20% below normal, the same as seen during basic training, only have a 30% increase in blood flow, a 93% decrease.?This is corrected by increasing the amount of potassium available via an external source, such as Krampade.?Even normal tissue benefits as added potassium further increases blood flow, increasing endurance, recovery, and overall athletic performance.

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During repeated bouts of exercise, the ability of the exercising tissue to restore potassium declines as the number of bouts increases.?It is well known that the primary driver of fatigue during exercise exceeding 2 hertz, or 2 cycles per second, is potassium loss.?Repeated exercise requires increased recovery time due to the longer amount of time needed to try to replenish the potassium in the muscle.?By adding an exogenous source of potassium, such as Krampade, the tissue much more quickly restores the potassium needed for your best performance.?Hence, during a workout or competition, having Krampade between sets or shifts greatly speeds the recovery during competition giving athletes and teams a major edge over the competition.

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Many athletes experience a plateau when training.?This is at least partially caused by a lack of potassium in the muscles.?When training, the muscles undergo a process called supercompensation, which is seen as an athlete makes gains in strength and endurance over time.?When potassium is too low, the muscles lose their ability to super compensate, and a plateau occurs.?This can be easily remedied by simply increasing the amount of potassium consumed and restoring the potassium content of the muscles.

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The best source of potassium is always in the form of a liquid, and Krampade is the only product that has enough potassium to properly fuel the needs of athletes.

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Heat stress safety – sodium versus potassium

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Heat stress is a more common problem, especially as the world gets gradually warmer.?The typical response when it comes to combating heat has been to increase sodium intake via salt pills.?This, however, may be a misguided and potentially dangerous approach.

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Increased sodium intake has been shown repeatedly to not have a bearing on athletic performance in the heat.?When it comes to heat injury, there is no link established between increasing sodium intake and increasing resistance to heat injury.?There is, however, evidence that high sodium diets may actually increase the likelihood of heat injury.

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A large cohort analysis showed that elderly patients with high sodium were less likely to survive complications from a heat stroke than those with normal or low sodium levels in their plasma.?In this analysis, high, but not low or normal, sodium was an independent risk factor of morality in heat stroke patients.?

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Other evidence shows that low potassium is a risk factor for an increased risk of heat injury.?From as early as 1940, evidence has been collected that shows low potassium is a critical part of increasing the risk of heat stress and injury, while there is no evidence that low sodium is a risk factor.?

As talked about previously, the loss of the ability to sweat is principally due to a lack of potassium, not dehydration.?Bodily fluids, including sweat, requires potassium to move the fluid from the gland to the exterior.?This is why the potassium content of sweat is consistent and independent of potassium intake, while sodium content is variable and is directly dependent on sodium consumption.?In fact, sedentary behavior in the heat has an average loss of 4500 mg of potassium regardless of potassium intake.?Sodium loss in sweat can be very high or very low, completely dependent on sodium consumption.

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In order to have a higher resistance to heat stress it is critical to have sufficient potassium in your diet and to limit sodium.?The likely scenario is to have sufficiently high potassium to overcome low sodium, which Krampade makes easy to do without sacrificing current dietary habits.

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Potassium Improves Muscle Function, even in non-athletes

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When talking about muscle function, we typically think about athletic performance.?Clearly having enough potassium in the muscles is imperative for athletic performance and recovery, but what about those of us that are not as active?

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Low potassium has repeatedly been showed to result in muscle cell degradation and death.?Typically, this first starts with a loss of striation and necrosis of the tissue.?The loss of function is normally restored by simply adding more potassium to the diet.?

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The loss of proper muscle function seen in case studies of human patients has been repeated in multiple animal models.?These animals can do significantly less work when potassium depleted, have much less blood flow into the muscles, and also overheat much more rapidly.?These observations closely follow the observations of how low potassium affects muscle function, athletic ability, and increased susceptibility to heat stress.

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Potassium improves cardiovascular health

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When researching potassium online, there is typically a thought that high potassium will cause heart arrhythmias.?While this is true about very, very high amounts of potassium, increasing potassium intake is typically beneficial for cardiovascular health.?

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It is important to note that the cardiac, or heart, muscle is radically different compared to skeletal muscle when it comes to potassium regulation.?The common dogma is that high dietary potassium results in an arrhythmia.?There is actually no good evidence of this, but there is considerable evidence that low potassium can cause arrythmias, potentially deadly ones.?It is important to note that physical training significantly reduces risk in any case, so exercise is important.

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High blood pressure is the most common risk factor for cardiovascular incidences and having a high potassium diet is proven to reduce blood pressure, especially in people predisposed to salt-sensitive high blood pressure.?Large studies among the African-American population shows that increasing potassium consumption can significantly lower blood pressure.?Repeated studies show that increasing potassium intake lowers blood pressure and the risk of later consequences, such as stroke. ?

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Similar to skeletal muscle, only increasing potassium intake can prevent cardiac cell necrosis (death) while increasing sodium does not.?In fact, increasing sodium intake and lowering potassium intake increases the likelihood of cardiac cell death.

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Hence, the potassium in Krampade may help improve cardiac health by simply increasing potassium intake and compensating for our high sodium diet by supplying enough potassium to lower blood pressure and help cardiac muscle cell function, similarly to how the high potassium in Krampade helps skeletal muscle function.

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Low potassium linked to kidney dysfunction

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Kidney function decreases over time, but this is accelerated by high blood pressure.?As discussed, having a high potassium, low sodium diet lowers blood pressure.?Low potassium further degrades kidney health as low potassium results in hyperplasia, or a high turnover of cells resulting in a leaky, low-functioning kidney.

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Short term potassium loss and subsequent kidney damage often results in the inability of the kidney to concentrate urine.?This was seen in 1940 in the British Army stationed in modern Iraq when the soldiers had insatiable thirst and urinated heavily.?This was later measured in miners in similar environmental conditions and there was an inability to concentrate urine, meaning increased water loss in the heat.?By simply adding potassium to the diet, this can be reversed.?

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Anatomically, low potassium quickly kills the endothelial cells lining the kidney, which results in a rapid rate of division and lesions forming.?This largely explains the inability to concentrate urine and how increasing potassium can quickly restore normal function.?

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Kidney stones are very painful and formation of these is reduced primarily by increasing potassium consumption and fluid intake.?

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Chronic kidney disease is a common ailment affecting about 15% of the adult American population.?In a clinical trial examining the potassium content showed that all patients with chronic kidney disease had low potassium levels in their tissues, though their serum levels were normal, and increased sodium in their tissues.?This common denominator indicates that maintaining proper potassium levels inside cells is important for long-term kidney health.?It also shows in another population that serum potassium is not a good indicator of potassium levels.

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The potassium in Krampade helps to increase potassium in your diet and may be beneficial for kidney health, both in the short term and the long term.

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Does sodium and potassium affect the brain?

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Much like muscles, nerves and glial cells use sodium and potassium to transmit signals affecting a multitude of functions, from behavior to motor coordination.?While we do know that there are effects, we do not really understand exactly how things work.

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High sodium is largely detrimental to cognition and has been more widely studied than potassium.?High sodium actually decreases cognition by indirectly restricting blood flow in the brain.?This is done via an increase in a molecule called interleukin-17 (IL-17) which eventually inhibits nitric oxide production.?Essentially the brain is not able to alter blood flow efficiently to feed parts that need more energy.

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Potassium in the brain is uniquely distributed.?Much more (about 2.5 times) potassium is found inside the mitochondria, the energy production unit of the cell.?It is unknown why this is, but the mitochondria in the brain function in a unique way compared to other tissues.?

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Low potassium does impair learning in chicks and can alter behavior in various animal models.?This has been difficult to study in humans, but there has been a small study done on women suffering from premenstrual syndrome.?

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Two small studies examined how potassium supplementation effects the signs of premenstrual syndrome.?In one study 8 of 11 women in their 50s had their PMS symptoms resolved and another with 7 women with severe PMS had their PMS symptoms stop by their 4th menstrual cycle while taking daily potassium supplementation.?

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While these are not conclusive, the evidence that increasing potassium consumption and decreasing sodium consumption is largely beneficial to cognition and perhaps mental health is slowly being shown.

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Potassium may help reduce risk of diabetes

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According to the Centers for Disease Control, about 96 million Americans over 18 have prediabetes, or roughly 38% of the total population.?These are estimates as the number of people aware of their status of having prediabetes is only 19%.?

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Several very large clinical studies have shown that increasing potassium consumption significantly lowers the likelihood of prediabetics developing type 2 diabetes.?Increasing potassium consumption lowers the amount of blood sugar in those with prediabetes.?People with type 2 diabetes typically have lower amounts of potassium in their urine and in their diet.

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Hence, increasing potassium intake is a very important component of working to prevent the development of type 2 diabetes, especially for those with metabolic syndrome or prediabetes.?Krampade is an easy way to get needed potassium in an inexpensive and convenient way.

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Potassium may help increase the effectiveness of dieting and weight loss

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Nearly 42% of Americans are considered obese.?Many try various diets to try and lose weight spending about $33 billion per year on various products.?These work to varying degrees, but why is it that the same protocol works well for some and not others?

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A rather large study examined this variability and found that the difference in success came down to the potassium content in a calorie restricted Mediterranean diet.?Those that had higher than average potassium consumption lost higher than average weight when consuming similar calories over the course of a year.?The increase in potassium consumption was the primary differentiator in weight loss among the dieters.

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There is a strong correlation of overall increased potassium in the diet and a reduced risk of developing obesity, metabolic syndrome, and diabetes.?High potassium consumption is also correlated with decreased body fat, while high sodium is correlated with increased body fat.?The larger the sodium content of the diet is compared to potassium, the higher a person’s body mass index (BMI), or, in other words, rate of obesity.?While high sodium could simply be an indicator of an overall unhealthy diet, the fact that high potassium is the main differentiator in the effectiveness of dieting shows that increasing potassium intake could help with overall weight management.

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Healthy diet and exercise are the two main drivers of maintaining a healthy weight, but increased potassium in the diet is the main differentiator between those with similar diets and the effectiveness in losing weight.?Hence, the potassium in Krampade can decrease the sodium to potassium ratio easily and inexpensively.?This in turn may help a dieter see greater success in managing their weight.

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Maintain more potassium than sodium in the diet

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The human body evolved in a high-potassium, low-sodium world.?The body is designed around saving sodium and wasting potassium, which has been demonstrated in repeated studies.?The obligatory loss, or the loss under extreme starvation conditions, the loss of sodium is just under 200 mg per day, while potassium is three times as much at about 600 mg per day.?Hence, ideally, we should consume at a minimum twice as much potassium as sodium, which is why the Food and Drug Administration has an upper limit recommendation of 2300 mg per day for sodium and a lower limit recommendation of 4700 mg per day for potassium.

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Unfortunately, very few Americans get enough potassium, with only 1% of women and about 25% of men getting enough, while there is an overconsumption of sodium.?It isn’t just Americans that consume far too much sodium and not enough potassium.?This dietary issue is a problem throughout the world.

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Americans consume about 3.4 grams of sodium per day and about 2.6 grams of potassium.?Germans consume what we would assume is a healthy amount of potassium at 4 grams, but also consume a tremendous 10 grams of sodium per day.?The health benefits of the increased potassium are washed away by the increased sodium as Germans have similar cardiovascular problems as Americans.?Further emphasizing the importance of the sodium potassium ratio is in Japan, the nation that leads the world in the number of women experiencing menstrual cramps, consumes a paltry 2 grams of potassium with 10 grams of sodium.

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Krampade is the simple solution to consume more potassium than sodium in your diet, and reap the benefits, without major changes to current sodium consumption.?With 2000 mg per serving, two servings per day is enough for the average American to consume nearly double the potassium to sodium on the average.

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Krampade is the only product that easily and inexpensively helps you get your electrolyte intake properly balanced, so try some today.??