Regulates Water Intake

In this week’s post I will be discussing the mechanisms of how our body regulates water intake and output. It’s important for our body to have fluid balance, this is when our body balances out what fluids we take in or gain versus the amount of fluids that our body losses or excretes. One of the more obvious ways we gain water is by consuming food and drinks, this is called preformed water. Our bodies also keep our fluids up by creating metabolic water. According to Saladin metabolic water is “produced as a by-product of a dehydration synthesis reaction and aerobic respiration” (Saladin 2015 p.925.). We can lose water in many different ways. For example, we can lose water through exhaling air, urination, feces, sweat, and cutaneous transpiration (Saladin, 2015. P. 925.) Water loss can be very obvious at times like when we go to the bathroom, this is called insensible water loss. However, sometimes we are not aware that we are losing any water at all, one example of this is when we exhale air. This is called Obligatory water loss and there is pretty much nothing that can be done about it other than to replenish it the fluids that have been lost. …show more content…
One of the more obvious signs of thirst is when our mouths get dry. Our bodies can detect that we are in need of water due to the osmoreceptors located in the hypothalamus (Saladin, 2015. p. 927.). According to Saladin, these are a bunch of neurons that can tell when the osmolarity in our plasma has increased and we are starting to become dehydrated. Osmoreceptors can also tell if we have low blood pressure, which according to the Mayo clinic is a symptom of dehydration (Mayo Clinic, n.d.). The feeling of thirst will stop once fluids are absorbed from the small intestine making our blood pressure go up (Saladin, 2015.