When the potassium level is too high in blood, it causes the condition of hyperkalemia. Though there are many benefits of potassium in our bodies, too much of potassium can cause trouble. Potassium is an essential mineral that your cells, tissues and organs require. For skeletal and smooth muscle contraction, potassium is highly important. It is also an important mineral for your heart. The opposite of hyperkalemia is hypokalemia. This is the condition of low potassium level in the blood, which isn’t a healthy condition either. It causes weakness and your cellular processes are affected.

Right amount of potassium in blood:
To keep yourself healthy, right amount of potassium is needed. The amount of potassium required by everybody is not the same. There is no RDI (reference daily intake) for potassium, but to make sure level of potassium isn’t too high or low, there should be an intake of 3,500 mg per day by the means of food.

Ways to bring down your high potassium level:
Food is one of the major sources of potassium. If the level of potassium is too high in your body, then the first thing you can and should do is cut down on foods that are high in potassium. You can avoid foods like apples, potatoes, milk, spinach and bananas for cutting down or preventing the level of potassium in your blood that has gone high.

If you reduce salt substitute in your food, your chances of high potassium will come down. Salt substitute does not only increase the level of potassium in your blood, but also causes other health problems and is in general dangerous for your body. You can replace salt substitute with herbs and spices so you get only enough salt and potassium and nothing in excess.
You can use herbs to treat this condition of hyperkalemia but under the supervision of a medical professional. You can take 150 mg of licorice each day as that helps potassium levels in your blood. However, you must not take licorice if you have high blood pressure.

When your kidneys fail or don’t perform properly, it leads to level of potassium being too high in the blood. For this reason, you should treat your kidneys. You can take help of acupuncture and massage to stimulate your kidneys’ functioning. Marshmallow and cranberry are great for killing unwanted bacteria in the kidneys and that helps with better and improved functioning of kidneys.

Drink plenty of water and eat a very healthy and balanced diet with regular exercising to get your body back on track without any diseases and without having the levels of potassium too high in your body.