A Sodium Calculator Review

With sodium levels that Canadians are consuming making the news again (check out CBC's Marketplace tonight at 8 pm) and reading a summary that excess dietary salt can induce an auto-immune inflammatory response , I decided to try out a new sodium calculator created by U of T dietitian JoAnne Archand and others that I read about in the Toronto Star today. I did this for both myself and with my husband's data since our diets are practically the same.  I'll say this about it: it is easy to use and gives a good estimate of how much sodium you would be consuming daily of regular products. The calculator takes into account your age and gender, how often you eat out or order in, as well as how often you use convenience products. When you are done, it breaks down where you're getting most of your salt from and what percentage it is in your diet. I believe that to get the most representative estimate of your daily sodium intake you should use an average month of your diet when filling out the survey. 

Now, if we were using regular products and according to the way I answered the survey, we would be over the recommended amount of sodium per day mostly from added salt (mine), bakery and bread products, processed meats and fish (everything's good with bacon but I do try to be reasonable)  and cheese and dairy products (I do love my cheese). We did come  in at under 2,300 mg per day of regular products on average and I'll admit that some months our sodium intake is higher than others (like this month we're having a bit of a bakery goodies spree) but we are doing better than the average Canadian intake of 3,400 mg and that we can do better. I believe that the bakery and bread products score high because they are a major source of hidden sodium in the average diet.

 The creators of the calculator admit that the calculator doesn't have all sources of sodium (it's just so wide spread and in so may products) and that they used the median amount of sodium weighted by the number of  products in a given food category. They also state that, depending on your eating patterns, it may under estimate the amount of sodium in your diet by 30% or, if you are using the lowest sodium products available, the calculator will over estimate how much sodium you are consuming.

I do like the fact that they break down where you are probably getting most of your sodium from as it will allow you to make changes to your diet (I know that I shouldn't add salt and that I eat too much cheese but I love it) and that they are using Canadian data. The only other criticisms I have is that if you say, eat out or order in only once or a couple of times a year that you only have a choice of picking either 1 or under times per month or never. If you choose the once a month choice the calculator will definitely over estimate your daily sodium intake. I also dislike the fact that when choosing the bread products it doesn't say if it's a serving or not. So, say you have a sandwich for lunch every day, does that mean you are eating bread products 2-3 times per day, as a serving is 1 slice of bread, or only once ( I used once)?

I realize that this sodium calculator is a beta version, but all in all, I think it is very good and it's a useful tool to see where you are getting sodium in you diet so that you can make changes. I'd recommend this sodium calculator to anyone who is concerned about their health and interested in curbing their sodium intake.