by Fern Shaw | Dec 13, 2012 | Health and Hydration
Encourage your children to eat water-rich foods
At home and in the lunchbox, encourage your child to eat water-rich foods like grapes, watermelon, cucumbers, carrots, and tomatoes.
Float slices of fruit (such as lemons or limes) in a jug of water
Or be creative with strawberries, clementine segments and any other colourful fruit.
Let your children drink what they want – within reason
Water is always going to be the healthiest drink for both children and adults, but if plain water makes them turn their noses up, give your children a little more freedom. Milk, natural juice, and flavoured water all work. However, to help them avoid a caffeine or sugar addiction early in life; never let them try fizzy drinks (or worse, take one to school). Hydrated children are happy children.
Give your child a straw.
It may sound strange, but we actually drink more when we’re drinking through a straw. With a straw, kids will be encouraged to drink more fluids, and they may enjoy the fun factor of having a straw in their favourite colour.
Use ice cube trays that make fun shapes and use those ice cubes in your child’s water
Nothing quite like the fascination of watching an ice cube shape melt while drinking your water and should the ice cube drop or fall, no mess apart from a little puddle!
Take your child to pick out a new, special cup
Young children are big on ‘ownership’, especially when there are siblings, so once they have their own individual drinking cup, this will encourage them to use their cup for drinking from.
by Fern Shaw | May 27, 2012
Are you dehydrated?
A massive 96% of UK office workers are reported to be dehydrated. A mere 2% drop in hydration can lead to a 20% drop in concentration.
Staying hydrated is crucial for maintaining your physical and mental well being. A simple way of determining your hydration status is by looking at the colour of your urine and comparing it with the colour chart on the left.
When you are drinking enough water your body is in balance and your urine will be a pale straw yellow colour (hydrated).
When you have not drank enough water your kidneys try to save as much water as they can and cause your urine to be darker in colour (Dehydrated).
Below are just some of the effects of dehydration:
- Fatigue
- Headaches
- Nausea
- Confusion
- Painful urination
Thankfully, regaining hydration is simple. One or two cups of water will quickly give the body the water it needs and help you maintain a healthy and active life.
Why not download our PDF and enable yourself to put a chart up in your toilets to help your staff stay hydrated – Download the pdf here.
by Fern Shaw | Apr 9, 2024 | mains fed water cooler, water boiler, water cooler, Water Coolers
Today it is increasingly common to find one if not more water cooler stations in the workplace. Aside from the more obvious – making sure everyone has access to drinking water – there are several positives that not only benefit everyone but the organisation as a whole.
Why? Because keeping employees hydrated creates a set of positive outcomes, all of benefit to the entire workplace.
Crucial for physical well-being. *Dehydration can lead to an array of physical discomforts, including fatigue, muscle cramps and headaches. In particularly demanding work environments, such as construction sites or manufacturing facilities, the risk of heat-related illnesses significantly rises when employees are not adequately hydrated.
Promoting hydration at work is not just about comfort but also about ensuring the safety and well-being of your employees. By providing access to clean drinking water and encouraging regular hydration breaks, employers can reduce the risk of on-the-job accidents and promote a healthier work environment.
Increased productivity and cognitive function. Two primary negatives of dehydration are reduced cognitive ability which leads to reduced productivity. Providing your workforce easy access to a water replenishment station is the simplest and most direct route to ensuring good hydration habits.
Morale and mood boosting. Irritability, mood swings and increased stress levels are often indicators of dehydration. This can result in decreased job satisfaction and an inharmonious work environment, all which can severely affect productivity and well-being. By encouraging hydration, employers can contribute towards the improved moral and mood boosting of every individual at the workplace.
It therefore makes sense to make use of a well-established organisation with decades of experience in the supply and installation of high-quality water coolers. Be that mainsfed, bottled water coolers, hot water boilers and bottled water deliveries, AquAid are proud to be of service to more than 34,000 customers across the U.K.
*source – from an article at Corporate Wellness Magazine
by Fern Shaw | Mar 14, 2024 | water cooler, Water Coolers
It’s World Sleep Day this week. The day is dedicated to bringing attention to the vital role adequate sleep plays in maintaining health and well-being. With millions of Britons suffering from a similar ailment – an inability to get enough sleep – we look at how good hydration can assist in creating better sleep.
Does drinking enough water aid our ability to sleep better?
The short answer is, yes it does.
How so?
During deep sleep, your body works to repair muscle, organs and other cells. Chemicals that strengthen your immune system start to circulate in your blood. If you are properly hydrated, your body is better fuelled, more easily able to effect these vital repairs.
How soon before bed should you drink water?
The rule of thumb is not to drink lots of water (or any liquids) at least two hours before bed. Ideally the bulk of your water consumption should be during the day or well ahead of bedtime.
Although dehydration can occur during sleep, this is easily repairable by drinking water upon waking.
What is the drinking water after bedtime conundrum?
Drinking a small amount of water before bed can keep you hydrated overnight, but too much and you’ll disrupt your sleep cycle with trips to the bathroom.
Having access to a constant supply to refreshing drinking water throughout the day is essential to ensure you can easily maintain sufficient hydration. Which is yet another reason to make sure you visit your water cooler regularly during the day, keeping yourself properly hydrated and well prepped for a good night’s rest.
by Fern Shaw | Feb 27, 2024 | water cooler, Water Coolers
While the current cold weather seems wont to extend its icy hold over the UK our instinct may be to hydrate less, this is a mistake.
When it’s cold, we may tend to think that we dehydrate less easily than we do when it’s warm, but this is often not the case. *What occurs is the body’s thirst response diminishes, by as much as forty percent, even when we’re already dehydrated. This happens due to the body’s blood vessels constricting when cold in order to prevent blood from flowing freely to the extremities. This enables the body to conserve heat by drawing more blood to its core. Because of this, the body is fooled into thinking it has properly hydrated, e.g. you don’t feel as thirsty and your body doesn’t conserve water. What may also occur is as you are less inclined to drink more water voluntarily; your kidneys don’t receive the signal to conserve water and urine production increases, again potentially leading to dehydration.
This increased urine production and reduced thirst response are only two of the contributing factors. Some others include:
- When wearing multiple, heavy layers of clothing, our bodies have to work between ten and forty percent harder. As such, we sweat more and lose more fluid.
- We also experience increased respiratory loss. This is when you lose water vapour through your breath, which means there is an increase of fluid leaving your body.
- The fact that sweat evaporates more quickly in cooler temperatures means your body is, once again, fooled into thinking you need less fluid.
The simplest method to counteract cold weather dehydration is to keep an eye on how often you drink water, much like you would during warmer weather.
If you usually make regular trips to replenish your water container from the work water cooler, carry on doing so. Should you work from a home office or remote location, set a repeat alarm on any tech gadget you use.
If chilled water is too much to consider drinking, drink ambient (indoor) temperature water.
If you can only consider drinking piping hot water from your hot water boiler, that’s fine, however, try to balance out each hot drink with a drink of cool water and keep yourself well hydrated, whatever the weather.
*source: First Aid For Life
