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Zinc and Bladder Infection

Oct 7, 2011 | By Marcia Veach
Zinc and Bladder Infection
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The bladder and kidneys are part of your urinary tract, along with the tubes that lead between the kidneys and bladder, called ureters, and the tube that carries the urine out of your body, called the urethra. An infection in the urinary tract generally includes the bladder. About 95 percent of bacteria that cause urinary tract infections enter through the external opening of the urethra, according to the University of Maryland Medical Center. The rest originate in the kidneys. Your zinc intake is one of many factors that may help you alleviate a bladder infection.

Zinc and Urinary Tract Infections

Zinc is a trace mineral that aids your neurological function, reproductive system, cell structure and immune system and acts as an antioxidant. One of its roles in the immune system is to boost the actions of white blood cells, which are needed to fight infections. If you’re deficient in zinc, it could affect your ability to combat bacterial infections, such as UTIs. Zinc was found to be especially helpful in supporting the immune system for older people, according to a study reported in the January 1998 “Journal of the American Geriatric Society” by C. Fortes and others from the National Institute of Health in Rome, Italy. If you’re over 65, getting an adequate amount of zinc in your diet is especially important.

Zinc and Interstitial Cystitis

You may think you have a bladder infection or UTI if you feel an urgent or frequent need to urinate and you have pain in your lower abdomen or pelvic region. This may, however, be interstitial cystitis, also called painful bladder syndrome, a type of bladder pain that isn’t caused by bacterial infection, according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Zinc helps protect the cell walls, so it may help reduce damage to your tissues from inflammatory conditions, such as IC.

Zinc in Your Daily Diet

The best source of dietary zinc is oysters, but you can also get an adequate supply from some other types of seafood, as well as red meat, poultry, beans, nuts, whole grains and fortified breakfast cereals. If you’re a vegetarian or vegan, or if you’re older than 65, you are likely to need a supplement to meet your daily need for this trace mineral. The recommended dietary allowance of zinc for adult men is 11 milligrams per day; for adult women, it’s 8 milligrams per day, according to the Office of Dietary Supplements. The Linus Pauling Institute suggests ingesting 15 milligrams per day, an amount that can usually be met by taking a daily multivitamin supplement.

Warnings about Zinc

While zinc deficiency can impede your immune response, you should be careful about taking an excess of this mineral. If you get too much in a single dose, you might experience abdominal pain, diarrhea, nausea or vomiting. If you regularly ingest excess zinc, you might throw off the balance of vitamins and minerals in your body, and you would be especially vulnerable to copper deficiency. Excess zinc can affect how your body utilizes certain antibiotics, and in a study reported in the February 2007 “Journal of Urology,” A. R. Johnson and others at the University of Wisconsin found that high levels of zinc were a cause of increased hospital admissions due to urinary complications, including urinary tract infection. The ODS has set 40 milligrams as the upper tolerable intake level for zinc each day.

References

Article reviewed by Hope Molinaro Last updated on: Oct 7, 2011

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