Millions of peoples are now suffering from kidney diseases and other diseases ,and with epidemic spread ,need more concern about levels of metals and anions in drinking water is related to the dissolved minerals in the water. General hardness is a misleading term that is often confused with carbonate hardness or temporary hardness, which is actually related to alkalinity and relates to the "buffering capacity" of the water (its ability to resist pH changes). This means that if the carbonate hardness is high then the pH will be extremely stable or alternatively if the carbonate hardness is low the pH of the water will be able to fluctuate easily. The term general hardness should be replaced with a simpler term: Hardness. Water hardness is the measurement of the amount of ions which have lost two electrons (divalent cations) dissolved in the tested water and is therefore, related to total dissolved solids. The more divalent cations dissolved in the water the "harder" the water. Generally the most common divalent cations are calcium and magnesium, however other divalent cations may contribute including iron, strontium, aluminum, and manganese. Typically the other divalent cations contribute little to no appreciable additions to the water hardness measurement. A stream or river's hardness reflects the geology of the catchment's area and sometimes provides a measure of the influence of human activity in a watershed. For example, sites that have active or abandoned mines nearby often have higher concentrations of iron ions in the water resulting in a very high hardness degree.b so do we care for hardness of water?
Hi, Tareq,
According to studies on lithiasis diseases and particularly kidney stones, the hardness of the water in terms of calcium and magnesium is not a problem for the patient. On the contrary, it has been proven that magnesium is an excellent inhibitor of kidney stones.
Yes we do use hardness as an indicator. However, it is one of the physicochemical indicators among many and cannot be used exclusively to deem water as polluted
Yes, we can measure cations like sodium, calcium, magnesium, potassium etc. and anions like sulphate, phosphate, bicarbonate etc. to determine the hardness of drinking water for health purpose.
Hi, Tareq,
According to studies on lithiasis diseases and particularly kidney stones, the hardness of the water in terms of calcium and magnesium is not a problem for the patient. On the contrary, it has been proven that magnesium is an excellent inhibitor of kidney stones.
Dear friend professor .the formation of stones created by the shortage of calcium and the RO water used by many peoples instead of hard water induce the reverse reaction to form calcium oxalate,therefore magnesium is good to affect formation of stone,you are absolutely right my dear.
Do we measure hardness of drinking water contents of cations and anions for health purposes?
No, we don't. Hardness is a parameter that we measure for technical reasons, i.e., scaling. Hardness will also affect the reactivity of chemical species in water.
Dear friend ,research shows thar cities who drink hard water has less cases of heart diseasescompared to soft water drinkers.
Tareq Alasadi, The water hardness is a classic quality parameter in water supply. It reflects the sum of divalent cations and this no specific health effect.
Originally the parameter was used to measure the fitness of water used in boilers there hardness correlate with the formation of kettle stone (mainly CaCO3 precipation) and another important effect is the inactivation of soap by formation of leather (salts of carboxylic acids). For these effects it is desired supplied water is not too hard. Very low hardness correlate with corrosion of metals in the water systems so generally extremely soft water is also undesirable.
The correlation between hard water and less problems with heart is correlated with magnesium so it is better to measure this specifically for health purposes.
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