U of A Student Publishes Research Connecting Visits to Bathroom With Hydration

Heidi Stambuck

Jenna Burchfield conducted the research for her article published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition in the Human Performance Lab at the U of A.

A University of Arkansas graduate student recently published an article in a peer-reviewed journal regarding her research on hydration. Jenna Burchfield is in the exercise science program and has been conducting research on whether hydration is correlated to the number of times people go to the bathroom a day.

"I researched pretty much this college population, so we looked at younger people and then just tried to decide if how many times you went to the bathroom in a day could be a hydration predictor," Burchfield said.

Burchfield asked a group of students to record their liquid consumption for a day. Afterward, their laboratory urine tests and urine color were analyzed in order to determine their hydration status and correlate their number of urine voids to already established tests.

Burchfield's research concluded that assessing the number of times you go to the bathroom in a day can in fact be a possible way to determine how hydrated you are. If a person goes to the bathroom an average of five times per day, you are likely to be more hydrated than those who went less, but it is important to remember that everyone is different, she said.

"I can't say definitively that you can and can't say that the number I found would say you're hydrated, but we found that just counting how many times you go to the bathroom throughout the day could be a possible way to assess how hydrated you are," Burchfield said. "Future research may be able to pinpoint an exact number for different populations."

Before she decided on her project, she assisted in the Human Performance Laboratory where hydration is one of the main focuses. Matt Ganio, assistant professor of kinesiology, is Burchfield's faculty mentor and directs the lab. Here, Burchfield learned how dehydration could affect everyone during all aspects of their lives, not just exercise.

"I think it's something that could help not only sports performance, but also a clinical population," Burchfield said. "Creating an easy way for people to know how hydrated they are might lead to people trying to be more hydrated."

Burchfield's research was published in January in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Getting the research published is usually the next step after finishing an honors thesis, but not one that everyone takes. Burchfield just decided to go above and beyond and submit her thesis, an action that, she said, has left her feeling honored.

"You spend all this time really researching something and looking at it and it's something that you have found and it's important," Burchfield said. "It's more than just something that I know, it's available to the world."

Burchfield will graduate with her master's degree in May and will go on to the University of North Texas Health Science Center to become a physician assistant.