Top 10 SUPER FOODS That Can Heal Your KIDNEYS

Hello Health Champions. Today we're going to talk about the top 10 foods that can help heal a kidney and the very first we need to clear up some confusion because usually they just talk about a kidney diet as if that was just one thing but it makes all the difference what stage of kidney disease do you have what are we trying to do here because the standard recommendations what they call a kidney diet that's about restricting certain things that is not about healing at all has nothing to do with it what they're talking about is

to minimize the consequences in advanced cases because the kidney isn't working so we have to limit certain things of the toxins don't build up too fast and when we're talking about healing recommendations when we're actually trying to fix a kidney and restore it back to normal now we're talking about something completely different when they classify kidney disease they divide it into different stages from one to five where stage three also has an A and A B and the diagnosis is based on something called creatinine and the kidneys as you may know filters out hundreds of

liters of water every day and with that water follows basically everything that's dissolved everything except really large particles like red blood cells and proteins so sodium and glucose and creatinine all filters out with the water but then the kidney reabsorbs everything of value so glucose gets reabsorbed at about a hundred percent as long as we're not diabetic sodium gets absorbed over 99 percent but creatinine gets reabsorbed at zero so if creatinine Rises that means that the kidney is not flowing very well there's not enough fluid going out through the kidney and this is measured in

milliliters per minute and it's called estimated glomerular filtration rate so they estimate that based on the level of creatinine and if you're filtering 90 milliliters or more that means you either completely normal or it means that you have some sort of kidney problem in stage one that's not related to the filtration volume it could be that they run a urinalysis and there is protein in the urine or something like that something different than filtration rate if you are filtering more than 60 but less than 90 you're called stage two and kind of ironically this is

called normal on a blood test so you could be stage one or stage two and you're still in the normal range for most blood tests because they don't cut it off until 60. the next one goes to 45 that's stage 3A and then we are down to 30 milliliters with 3B if you're between 15 and 30 it's called stage four and if you're less than 15 it's Stage 5 or end stage renal disease so you're basically at complete failure or very very close to it and at this point pretty much dialysis or a transplant would

be the only options now on average about 15 percent of the population has some sort of kidney compromise where they fit fit into one of these stages so that's about one in seven in the world and one percent out of that 15 is stage five so we're talking a very small percentage and here with including stage four that's three percent so here we have four percent out of one seven so we're still less than one percent of the population and these are the ones that really need to be careful these need to follow the guidelines

very very strictly and avoid all sorts of things but then we have the other part so stage one don't really have that problem at all they don't need to avoid anything stage two also don't need to avoid anything in terms of standard kidney diet they need to start working on the root cause what that ever might be which we're going to talk about so that's about 50 percent of the people who have some sort of kidney compromise and then in stage three three A is twice as common as 3B so overall we have about 20

percent of the people with some kid kidney problem who need to pay attention Stage 5 and 4 need to pay very very close attention but stage 3B they are not home free they need to re limit certain things and be careful with certain things but the rest about 80 percent of the people with kidney disease the kidney diet really doesn't apply at all because it's about restricting things that the kidney is failing to eliminate and we have about 20 percent of people who have that problem and we have 80 percent who don't so with stage

five kidney disease that's when the egfr is less than 15 there is major damage and they need to see a nephrologist if they're not if they get a blood work back and they're not working with a nephrologist they need to see one right away because they're very close to kidney failure and this is the most extreme version of limiting things so they need to limit basically everything sodium potassium phosphorus also nitrogen which means protein nitrogen is the byproduct of protein and they might even need to limit water because if the kidney is filtering that poorly

then you have to be careful with almost everything that you put in your body so do these cause chronic kidney disease and this is the huge confusion just because a person with kidney failure needed to avoid these does not mean that they are the cause instead these are resources we need minerals we need protein we need water when we're healthy to avoid getting it and if we have a mild case we need these to reverse it so we have to be very very clear because so often we make the mistake of saying if we have

to limit these when the kidney is damaged then they must be the cause and nothing could be further from the truth so we need them to heal instead and of course most important is prevention so you want to make the lifestyle changes before you ever get anywhere near this food number one is red grapes so the question is is that a good food I got a list of 25 foods that are very often recommended for kidney patients so we're going to go through and figure out if they are indeed Good Foods so the reason they

gave for this one was that it has antioxidants and anti-inflammatory property so that might be a good thing but it's kind of irrelevant to kidneys because it has very little to do with how the kidney heals or if it can filter things out so we also want to look at some things that are associated with kidney problems like phosphorus potassium sodium and sugar and I added the sugar because most or nobody really Associates sugar with a problem as far as kidney goes so we're going to talk about why that is but this would be a

good food as far as phosphorus potassium and sodium it's pretty low but that sugar is way too much and we'll talk about that next so red grapes is an X we do not want that on a kidney diet and in order to understand why that is we need to understand the causes the number one cause is type 2 diabetes and after that we have hypertension closely followed and then kidney infections in much smaller percentages medications can cause this and it is over-the-counter drugs and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs so these are things that we can buy straight

from the store they are no prescription and they're all your pain medication and all your colds and flus so you don't want to use those unless you absolutely have to then we have things like lupus which is an autoimmune disease so a lot of people know about rheumatoid arthritis that affects joints and and Bones basically well lupus is sort of the same thing but it goes after soft tissue and the kidney is one of those things that gets attacked we could also have poisoning from metals or chemicals that can hurt the kidney so a lot

of pesticides high doses of of environmental chemicals can create some problems as well and the reason I want to talk about sugar in addition to the traditional criteria is that the number one by far the biggest contributor to kidney disease is type 2 diabetes and not only that but it is the primary cause for hypertension as well so if we can handle the insulin resistance that causes type 2 diabetes and hypertension we have eliminated probably 90 percent of kidney disease right there number two is apples and the reason they give is that it's high in

fiber and antioxidants it's like this Mantra we keep hearing and also a good source of vitamin C so again this could be a good thing but it's not going to help the kidney all that much so if we look at the phosphorus potassium sodium then they're very low and this would seem like a good thing but again that sugar is kind of high so does that mean that apples are a bad food no not at all but if we're trying to reverse kidney disease and insulin resistance is a very common most common part of that

then we're probably not going to be reversing insulin resistance and kidney disease if we keep eating sugar however for someone who is very metabolically healthy then they might get away with eating a few apples and some fruit and some sugar here and there as long as they know where they are on the metabolic Spectrum so to speak so I would put a question mark there because then it would depend on where they are and how much they eat so it's not like a clear-cut case but for most people because most chronic kidney disease is due

to insulin resistance we are not going to put apples on this list number three is onions and they say that's a good thing because they provide flavor without adding a lot of potassium so let's see if that's true and we have good numbers on most of it potassium is not too high and sugar is not bad either so as long as you don't eat an entire meal like if you make onion soup and you eat a pound or a couple of pounds then you might get in trouble with the potassium but the way most people

eat onions when you give that a check mark number four is cauliflower one of my favorite foods I eat a lot of it they say it's low in potassium and a good source of vitamin C and fiber so let's see if that's true phosphorus is low potassium is 299 so in my book that's not really a low potassium in food on the contrary I often tell people that typically when people are healthy they they're looking for sources of potassium and cauliflower is a great source of potassium 299 is a pretty good number but not only

that how much of it can you eat so cauliflower being a very low carb very water rich food there's an opportunity to get tons of potassium so if you have a tiny bit as a side dish you're probably fine but we're going to put a question mark on that and why is that what does the question mark mean it means that something in here is kind of high so it depends on how much you're going to eat of it so let's say that you make mashed potatoes or cauliflower mash then it could be a serious

issue if you are in these groups the 3B 4 and 5 that need to restrict this so that means your egfr is less than 45 and if you ate one pound of cauliflower which is not that big a deal if you steam it and you squeeze some water out and you make mashed cauliflower as a potato substitute it would be pretty easy to get in the neighborhood of fifteen hundred milligrams of potassium so is that a lot well let's look at that so if you're stage three and four kidney disease that means there's moderate to

severe damage and they say that you should restrict sodium to less than two thousand I don't necessarily agree with that but we'll we'll go with it for now and they say that phosphorus needs to be less than a thousand but then protein between 60 to 80 so that's kind of a low to to moderate more on the low side and again it's mostly for stage four that you need to restrict that but then we're talking about potassium is why is that so important because if you can't eliminate potassium if your kidneys are out of shape

then as potassium builds up it could slow down your heart and in extreme cases it could stop your heart altogether so absolutely we want to avoid that so if you're in stage 3A they say you're still filtering well enough that it's not a problem in 3B they want to limit your potassium to 3 000 milligrams and if you're in stage four they want to limit it to less than 2 000. so if you try to heal your kidney with a keto diet which wouldn't be a bad idea and you eat tons and tons of cauliflower

then that could easily get above those limits especially with with other things that you probably eat and even though these limits are there to limit the consequences of if you already have some kidney damage we want to understand that there's still hope here there's still some regenerative capacity in the kidney if we start doing the right things number five is garlic and the reason they say it's good is that it may have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties so garlic shows up a lot it's a mid herb and it is very powerful I don't think there's any

problem in taking it for all sorts of reasons now if we look at the minerals here phosphorus is is kind of high Potassium is really high sodium sugar is really low but we have to remember that garlic is not something you're going to eat a pound of and if you have a couple of cloves or even a whole bulb you're not going to get enough that that potassium is really going to be a problem and on that note I probably want to mention Ginger also which is very similar in terms of medicinal properties antibacterial anti-fungal

it does a lot of good and again you're not going to eat a pound of Ginger it's pretty potent so you'll have a few grams or an ounce or so you're not going to be in trouble because you're not eating much of it so we put a check mark on both of those number six is cabbage and they say that it contains phytochemicals with anti-inflammatory properties again that's probably a good thing it may assist the kidney a little bit in healing but in terms of a kidney diet it's kind of irrelevant because we're trying to

limit things that the kidney can't filter so that doesn't really late at all but when we look at what it contains the things that we might need to avoid they're all very low so we don't have a problem with cabbage if you did a cabbage soup diet where that's all you eat then that might create some problems but if you just kind of use it normally no problem number seven is cherries they say they have antioxidants and anti-inflammatory properties so you hear how most of these Foods that's the reason they give and nobody really knows

why it's like they're just repeating a mantra they don't really know why these Foods belong on the list or not we've just heard these things they must be good for something eat more plants and fruit but we want to understand that the reasons so that we can do the right thing for our situation so phosphorus is low potassium is is up a little bit but the big one here again is the sugar and if we're trying to reverse insulin resistance which is a root cause of most kidney problems then cherries is not something that we

want to eat a lot of number eight is bell pepper and they say it's low in potassium and high in vitamin A and C the red and the green are slightly different and the one that sticks out as maybe getting a little bit high is the potassium so if you just have a few slices on the side not a problem but if you do like a stir fry with fajitas and you do tons and tons of of bell pepper and onion you might get up a little bit too high and the green is very similar

but you notice that it would probably be the better option if you're trying to really restrict potassium so we're going to give it a question mark it's probably all right the way most people eat it but the question marks there just to say that it would depend on how much you eat number nine is berries they say that they're low in potassium and a good source of vitamin C and fiber so I love berries let's see how they do and we're pretty low in all of these numbers raspberries were also pretty low and with strawberries

we're also pretty low so very very similar numbers overall so this is a great food if you're trying to reverse insulin resistance with a low carb or ketogenic diet you can still have a handful now if you work on a strawberry picking farm and you put one in your mouth for every strawberry you pick then you could probably get too much of both the sugar and potassium but if you eat a handful then you're going to be all right so we get check marks on those berries number 10 recommended food is egg whites they say

it's a low phosphorus source of high quality protein so let's talk about that egg white has really nice numbers here but I always tell people that you don't really want to eat egg white by itself because nature packaged it together for a reason and when you eat the whole egg now you're getting much much more phosphorus which could be a problem but you're getting less of the others it has the trace amount of sugar not a problem at all so here again it's going to depend on where you are like a Stage 5 wood stage

five or four would probably want to eat the egg whites and anybody else would probably want to eat the whole egg because you're getting much much better nutrition and the only issue would be that that phosphorus is a little bit High I'm still going to give this question mark because they call it a high quality protein and we need to understand that when you combine the egg white and the egg yolk it is an excellent source of protein in fact it's the best outside of mother's milk but when you isolate the white egg you're only

absorbing and utilizing about one-third so it's kind of a myth that it should be this great protein source so if you can at all then you definitely want to eat the whole egg but I still put a question mark on that because if you're doing a keto diet to heal your kidneys and reverse diabetes and you eat 10 or 12 or 15 eggs a day now you're probably going to push that phosphorus a little bit too high so if you have that issue then you probably want to limit yourself to two or three or four

eggs 11 is olive oil they say that it contains heart healthy monounsaturated fats and I totally agree when we look at it I would recommend extra virgin olive oil and even better organic because it's not very expensive these days for for that when we look at the minerals the phosphorus potassium and sodium we have very very low numbers it's zero to one basically non-existent but I wanted to point something out because this is a huge common misconception is that olive oil which is a plant oil or even a fruit oil if you want to be

strict has 16 percent saturated fatty acids and 74 monounsaturated fatty acids and it is most often compared to other plant oils so they say this is healthy and all the vegetable oils in the store they're healthy but in fact the fat in extra virgin olive oil is much closer to beef fat than it is other plant oils so beef actually has 42 percent monounsaturated fats which we know are the heart healthy ones and the saturated obviously is much higher because it's a solid fat it's part of an animal just like humans we store fat this

way also but we have a significant amount of monounsaturated fats and the other plant fats basically have no saturated fats so these two are much closer in relation than Olive Oil would be to other plant oils and overall olive oil is something that definitely gets a check mark put it on everything number 12 is pineapple they say it contains bromelain which is an enzyme that may have anti-inflammatory effects again that might be good if inflammation is part of the kidney thing but again a kidney diet is about avoiding things that can't get out so that's

a little irrelevant when we look at the numbers here the minerals are very low but the sugar is much too high so you do not want this on a kidney diet 13 is cucumber they say it's low in potassium and a refreshing option for hydration I would agree with that very fresh and it has very low numbers across the board so I don't have a problem at all eat cucumber 14 is radishes and again have antioxidants and anti-inflammatory properties just repeating that Mantra whether it's relevant or not for that list and again very nice numbers

just like cucumber basically and it gets a check mark even though it's not something that I personally enjoy very much but if you do go for it 15 is skinless chicken and they say it's low in phosphorus and high in protein so skinless chicken would have not super low but kind of low numbers and because it's a concentrated food you're not going to eat as much as you could of something that is more water rich but why would you eat skinless chicken when there is whole chicken unless you just want it to taste bad so

whole chicken has more fat and that's why they're telling you to eat the skinless but in fact the two factors that we're concerned with the phosphorus and the potassium are lower in the whole chicken and also you probably because the whole chicken has more fat it's more satisfying so chances are you would eat a little bit less of it so you control those numbers even better so I give it a question mark because it's going to depend on how much of it you eat I don't recommend the skinless over the whole so I think that

you can definitely eat the chicken it's just going to matter how much of it you eat and then there's cranberries and they say that it may help prevent urinary tract infections so cranberries are very often used for anything urinary tract like bladder infections and there's some evidence especially anecdotal that it can help support everything from the kidney to the bladder now let's look at the numbers and the numbers are really low over here but the sugar even if it isn't really high I put a question mark there and why is that well have you ever

tasted cranberries straight right they're very very tart so the only way people are going to eat them is loaded up with sugar served with the Thanksgiving turkey or they're going to hear about cranberry juice being good for urinary tract infections and they go to the store and they buy the thing that's almost as sugary as Coca-Cola so you don't want to do that at all however there is a way to get the job done and that is if you have an issue then you go by that concentrated cranberry juice and you only need a teaspoon

in in a big bottle of water it's pretty expensive probably thirty dollars or so for a tiny little bottle but it goes a long way then you sweeten it with stevia or something similar that's safe to sweeten things with and then you can drink it and probably get some of these benefits but if you start consuming things that are more like Coca-Cola it's not going to do you a lot of good 17 is buckwheat and they say that it's a whole grain that is a good source of protein fiber and nutrients what do the numbers

say well phosphorus is kind of high potassium sodium is not bad and the phosphorus if you're going to eat a lot of it then it's a problem if you just eat a tiny bit then it's not a problem it's a grain it's a concentrated food so you're probably not going to eat an enormous amount but if we keep in mind that most kidney problems have to do with carbohydrates and Insulin resistant that you're basically carbohydrate intolerant if you're trying to reverse that you do not want to go and eat something that is 72 percent carbohydrate

so an x on that 18 is eggplant says it's low in potassium and a good source of dietary fiber so we keep hearing these same things and they may be a good thing but why are they on this list and the numbers look pretty good the potassium is the only thing that sticks out a little bit at 229 so if you're just having like some Thai food maybe where they slice a little eggplant in there not a problem but if you are using the eggplant as a foundation like a casserole or a dish then it

could easily become too much of that potassium so we put a question mark there green beans pretty much the same thing low in potassium a good source of fiber and the numbers look very very similar same story if you're a total green bean addict you're going to eat it by the pound then it could add up but otherwise you're probably fine 20 is fish and they say it's an excellent source of Omega-3 fat and high quality proteins and I totally agree with that it's a fabulous food and if we take the case of salmon then

we see that the phosphorus potassium are pretty good they're they're a little bit on the high end but you are not going to eat all that much you're not going to eat salmon by the pound you're going to have four to six to eight ounces which is about 100 to 200 grams and it's concentrated it's going to give you a lot of satisfaction for a smaller amount so no problem there but if we include fish as an excellent source of good protein then we definitely want to consider beef also and it's just that saturated fat

thing that we've been told is bad which isn't true but in fact when it comes to the things that we want to avoid on a kidney diet the beef is actually looking a little bit better there so we're going to give both of these a check mark So when is there still hope for improvement rather than just limiting the consequences and the toxic buildup with stage five unfortunately it is probably too late in most cases there's not a whole lot you can do when it gets that far but it is a very small percentage of

the population so we want to understand this so we never let it get to that point you do want to work with a nephrologist which is a kidney specialist and they can measure these levels they can measure your kidney function and let you know when you need some some dialysis or maybe a kidney transplant when it comes to stage three and four though the odds are much better and especially stage four is going to be tough but it is possible to do something with it now it is going to matter if we have a lupus

versus an insulin resistance so if it's insulin resistant it is probably more straightforward in just reversing that insulin resistance diabetes situation whereas if it's lupus which is autoimmune then it may or may not be all that easy so I wouldn't give up on it but just know that some things are a little more straightforward and if it is insulin resistance then you definitely want to do some things to reverse that which is keto low carb fasting and there's some very powerful supplements that we're going to talk about also with stage two where you're still having

reasonably good kidney function you don't really need to restrict any foods then it's typically pretty straightforward and the supplements when it comes to stage five then there is a possibility it could help some but I wouldn't just go out and buy things off the shelf and try I would want to work with a professional with someone who can measure and monitor and know your situation and maybe muscle test and figure out what your body is looking for and this would not be instead of working with a nephrologist because they still need to monitor this very

closely in case something changes in stage three and four there are some very powerful supplements and in the clinic I have found some to kind of stand above others and and really be able to to help Serena food is from Standard Process renatrophin PMG from standard process and arginex so what do these do well arginex is kind of like a Drano a Roto-Rooter it cleans out the the pipes if you will it helps improve circulation it helps break down oxalates and Stones it's a great supplement for gout but it also helps everything that can get

stuck in the kidney it kind of helps move it through and it has some enzymes it if you look at the ingredients it doesn't tell the whole story there's more to it there's more activity because they kind of grown it renatrophin is to help repair tissue and it is especially if there's an autoimmune attack on the kidney but also anytime that there is tissue destruction that PMG is going to be very helpful and Rena food is a combination of renatrophin PMG and Argin X plus it has a few nutrients and other things to support the

kidney so in terms of dosage I wouldn't recommend that you just go out and and go crazy but just know that if you're in stage three or four you're probably going to need a little higher dosage than what the labels say that's just what I find in the clinic for the most part so probably if you have significant damage you might want to try all of these at together and then I would take maybe six Rena Foods six to twelve renatrophin PMG and probably 6 to 12 Argin X again it's good if you could have

someone to help you figure that out and if you are in stage two of kidney disease then I would just go with Arena food unless you have someone test you who shows a little bit different and then I would just go with the base recommendation of three for that 21 is asparagus it says it contains antioxidants and low in potassium and phosphorus we look at the numbers phosphorus is pretty low potassium not too bad so again depends on how much you eat if you just eat the three little sticks you get in a restaurant not

a problem if you eat it by the pound again you want to kind of watch out for it then we have celery which they say is low in potassium and is anti-inflammatory and when we look at the numbers not all that low in potassium and if you have a few little sticks with your chicken wings again no problem but if you get into the idea of juicing celery because it's so low in sugar which wouldn't be a terrible idea then you could if you need to restrict potassium that could build up pretty quickly if you

if you juice it if you just eat it you're probably not going to have a problem 23 is kale they say it's a nutrient dense leafy green and it's low in potassium so that's a good thing it appears and it's not all that low in potassium when we look at it however it takes a lot of work these numbers are per 100 grams and it takes a lot of work to eat a hundred grams of kale in a salad so it would take a lot to go over those limits however again if you juice it

then you could get more potassium but it is kind of rough on the body actually to juice kale and drink it kind of straight I tried that many years ago when I was doing some juice cleansing and let to tell you that wasn't real pretty so if you just eat it in a salad then you should be totally fine on that 24 quinoa it's a protein Rich grain that is low in potassium let's see how that works per 100 grams it has pretty high phosphorus pretty high potassium as well but this is per 100 gram

of dry grain so a hundred grams would probably wide the time you cook it 100 grams is probably a pretty sizable serving but again these numbers are not super low we're over 500 milligrams of potassium you'll probably be all right but again the one I'm concerned with is going to be the carbohydrates if you're trying to reverse kidney disease usually that means lowering carbs so having something that's almost all carb is not a great idea so we're gonna not put quinoa on the list and 25 is watermelon people love to put that on every kind

of list they say it's high in water content and it helps with hydration and it's low in potassium so let's look at those numbers so yes indeed phosphorus potassium sodium is pretty low sugar doesn't look terrible with six grams there on the surface it's sort of like onion but the question is how much would you eat of it could you eat more watermelon than you could onion I would say the answer is probably yes the other thing is that kind of guides Us in that direction is if it helps with hydration if you're trying to

drink let's just say a half a gallon a day and it's going to help with hydration you couldn't just have a little square and it'd help with hydration it's very very easy to consume watermelon you could very easily have a pound or even two that much of a consumption let's say you eat two pounds worth then the potassium could still get up there but more importantly that Sugar would be way way off the chart on that so we're going to put an x on watermelon also so when it comes to kidney and diet restrictions and

recommendations we have to understand cause versus damage control if we want to heal something then we want to address the root cause but most of the kidney diet has to do with damage control which means we try to limit the things that the kidney can't get rid of and that would increase toxicity in the body so the kidney diet the way it's presented there are some good points to it but it applies basically to chronic kidney disease five four and three B primarily and that's only 20 percent of the people who are classified as chronic

kidney disease all the others we are more interested in reversing and once we want to reverse it we have to understand the root cause and it's not so much about limiting it's not at all about limiting the minerals they are good nutrients we need the protein we need the fat we need all the good things to rebuild tissue but we want to get rid of the thing that interferes which is insulin that drives the kidney failure that drives the hypertension that drives the metabolic syndrome if you enjoyed this video you're going to love that one

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