You’ve probably grown up knowing that the color of your pee reveals some truths about your hydration levels. Have you ever checked just to make sure you’re drinking enough water?
If you’re interested in using your urine as a measure of your health, it may make you glad to hear that you can learn even more than just hydration levels by taking a peek at your toilet!
Health Magazine went to the experts to learn even more about what our pee is trying to tell us.
Ketan Badani is the Vice Chair of Urology at Mount Sinai. That means that he certainly knows a thing or two about the way that urine works in your body.
He was happy to offer some answers about the different lessons and information we can gather from our pee.
We know that a healthy body will have yellow urine. While the shade of yellow can vary quite a lot, you want your pee to fall in the yellow range. Having completely clear pee normally isn’t bad, but you don’t have to stress yourself out by guzzling water.
The ideal color your pee should be is straw-colored, a light yellow.
If the color is too dark of a yellow, close to amber, it’s a sign you might be dehydrated.
When that happens, your body is pulling water out from your kidney to hydrate other parts of your body.
There are some foods that can change the color of your pee.
It might be freaky to look down and see brown pee in the toilet. But it might not be time to worry yet. Rhubarb, fava bean, and aloe can all change your pee brown.
On another side of the color spectrum, blueberries, beets, and rhubarb (again!) have been known to tinge people’s pee pink or red.
Medications can also change how your pee looks.
If your pee is brown, it might be due to certain medications. The medication that commonly treats UTIs has been known to turn pee brown.
Also, your pee could be brown if you have just undergone a urologic procedure. In that case, the brown color would be due to blood dripping into your urethra.
Rifampin is one medication that might make urine look red.
Health conditions can also cause changes in urine color.
If you’ve gone through a mental checklist, and you haven’t had any foods or medications that could cause color changes in pee, then it’s time to consider seeing a doctor.
There are a variety of medical concerns that could impact your pee. For example, melanoma might turn your pee brown, and kidney stones or a UTI can leak blood into your urinary tract and cause pink pee.
There are certain unusual pee colors that really aren’t a cause for concern.
Although they might be shocking colors to see in your toilet bowl, blue and green pee colors normally don’t mean anything too crazy.
Green urine probably just means you had too much asparagus, and food dye can turn your pee blue.
If you rule those options out, then this cool-tinted color could just be caused by medications. Some muscle relaxers and heartburn treatments can create a blue color in your pee.
All in all, try not to freak out when you see a freaky pee color!
The chances of your pee color being due to some type of medical condition are relatively low. Your pee color, if it isn’t a shade of yellow, is far more likely to be altered by your diet and mediations.
Hopefully, this helps you keep calm and keep hydrating for a light yellow pee.
Learn more about your pee in the video below!
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