Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Potassium Extraction

zlev11 - 17-5-2015 at 16:43

Hi there,
Can anyone think of a way to remove potassium from a food product such as nuts or seeds? The food still needs to be edible and retain most of its original flavour. Boiling in water is somewhat effective but is there another way?

The motivation here is that people suffering from end-stage kidney disease can't excrete potassium well and must go on low-K diets. This cuts their food choices down considerably.
Thanks!

blogfast25 - 17-5-2015 at 18:04

Quote: Originally posted by zlev11  
Hi there,
Can anyone think of a way to remove potassium from a food product such as nuts or seeds? The food still needs to be edible and retain most of its original flavour. Boiling in water is somewhat effective but is there another way?

The motivation here is that people suffering from end-stage kidney disease can't excrete potassium well and must go on low-K diets. This cuts their food choices down considerably.
Thanks!


That's virtually IMPOSSIBLE.

DON'T try this 'at home'. The resulting food stuff could be very unhealthy for patients, not to mention NOT low-K at all.

Seriously, stick to medically approved low-K foods and brands. That's limiting, I understand that, but SAFETY FIRST.

Even in the few cases where K can be extracted from foods (quite difficult) you'd still need a means to determine K levels in those foods after treatment. NOT At ALL EASY if you're not equipped for that type of analysis.

[Edited on 18-5-2015 by blogfast25]

Hawkguy - 17-5-2015 at 18:54

You couldn't remove the Potassium, but maybe you could make food without it (from ground up, matrix style). Depends on what level of gruel you plan on eating... As well, it would take so much effort for something that will ultimately lack nutrients that it will likely not be worth the bother...

zlev11 - 27-5-2015 at 16:46

Thanks for the replies. It was mostly a thought experiment, I should have been way more clear on that I guess. Rest assured I would never concoct something like this at home and feed it to sick people. Saying it's impossible isn't all that helpful. This forum should be the place to brainstorm ways this could be theoretically possible. If anyone has any ideas, please comment. You can dispense with the well-meaning don't-try-this-at-home advise, I'll take it as implied.
Meet some patients in kidney failure and you might appreciate why something as small as chocolate or peanut butter that they can eat without hastening their kidney failure would be so appreciated.

blogfast25 - 27-5-2015 at 16:50

Quote: Originally posted by zlev11  

Meet some patients in kidney failure and you might appreciate why something as small as chocolate or peanut butter that they can eat without hastening their kidney failure would be so appreciated.


A very lame argument that nonetheless has my sympathy.

Here we can only 'brainstorm' about specific cases of food. So choose one. There is no 'general' procedure to extract potassium from whatever.

[Edited on 28-5-2015 by blogfast25]

phlogiston - 28-5-2015 at 05:59

Even if I could think of any methods, I would be extremely hesitant to make any suggestions that you might then be tempted to try and feed the products to already badly sick patients.

You would need to know exactly what you are doing, get appropiate permissions from medical ethics committee and have medical staff on standby should anything go wrong.

I understand your sentiment but still have doubts whether the risks outweight the potential benefits (which is exactly the kind of question the ethical committee should adress).

Metacelsus - 28-5-2015 at 06:57

Sounds like a job for an ion-exchange resin!

Wait . . . that only works with liquids.

blogfast25 - 28-5-2015 at 07:02

Quote: Originally posted by Cheddite Cheese  

Wait . . . that only works with liquids.


Can't drink apple juice all day either, can you? :)