So me and a friend are arguing about water intoxication...

[cyberslick]

Me and a friend got into a small feud about water ingestion related deaths:

We all know that drinking too much water causes you to die.

From my understanding, drinking too much water causes it to sit in the bowels, where it proceeds to absorb salt from the rest of the body for whatever reasons, this in turn causes water to rush back into said body parts, causing swelling (of the brain stem area) and ultimately death.

My question is this, would a faster metabolism keep you alive longer or actually cause you to "die" faster, assuming you were drinking enough water to kill you, in a relatively short time period, less than an hour.

Please let me know if this question is too vague. Kind of a weird first post eh?

hyponatremia in relation to metabolism I think could be an easy way of putting it.

I eagerly await your responses

[mith]

...salts are usually impermeable so they wouldn't be "sucked" out. Usually it's the water that moves to balance any osmolarity gradients.

Of course, you could drown.

[cardiorrhexis]

Here's a fabulous article I read a few years ago...

http://www.veccs.org/public/journal/abstracts.cfm?abstractID=37&abstractView=current

If you can't get a hold of the article, I still have the journal. I could scan it and post it if you'd like...

[AstusAleator]

Hmm, without doing any research on it, I'd say that by drinking so much water you're in danger of bursting cells since the water will diffuse into the higher ion gradient. Our bodies can deal with a LOT of water passing through them. You might have noticed if you have a night of heavy drinking that you'll have to pee almost as soon as you finish your drink. I believe, since your intestine walls are selectively permeable, most of the water you drink is filtered through your liver before being released to the rest of your body.
Perhaps your biggest threat from drinking so much water in such a short amount of time would be from rupturing your inestines or diluting your bile.

Anyway, interesting first topic I hope that people a little less lazy than myself will pull up some primary research and get to the bottom of this.

[beluga fiction]

...My question is this, would a faster metabolism keep you alive longer or actually cause you to "die" faster, assuming you were drinking enough water to kill you, in a relatively short time period, less than an hour....
hyponatremia in relation to metabolism I think could be an easy way of putting it

Faster metabolism...you mean...a more efficient metabolism, like people who make sport daily? Or faster...catabolic metabolism?
Sportmans do not loose so quickly minerals by sweat and their kidney could retains more salt when is necessary;
faster metabolism(catabolic) from malignant illness, old people, ... can not do the same performance, their acid-base balance and mineral balance could be easily broken.

[baikuza]

From my understanding, drinking too much water causes it to sit in the bowels, where it proceeds to absorb salt from the rest of the body for whatever reasons, this in turn causes water to rush back into said body parts, causing swelling (of the brain stem area) and ultimately death.

yes. because the first one you will get after drinking them is you can not breath, but this is differ if you are talking with liquid oxygen.
then because you can not take any breath you will lack of oxygen and blablabla... then you know, you will die.

i think what dangerous in drinking water too much is we can not take a breath, just like if you can not breath in the water. about absorbing them, i think it is the slower one than can not take any breath.
what i'm talking is conditoned in a short time.
not like drinking too much water but not till you can not breath.

if about the long time in drinking them, i think you will not let any water come in to your mouth again.
if you are talking injecting them as in infuse..., it can be like what the other said before...(but, i'm not sure because i still not open the URL typed by cardiorrhexis... oh well, i can not get those word... it is not mentioned in the page. sorry cardiorrhexis. maybe you can write the summary then. pls forgive me... i do not want to hurt any one)

[kementari]

Drinking large amounts of water causes the blood to become dilute, as the levels of electrolytes (sodium, potassium, and others) become very low.

"Often called "water intoxication" or "hyponatremia" (low salt)1, water poisoning results when too much water is ingested in too short a time without replenishing electrolytes, particularly sodium and potassium." ---Erowid Health Vaults

I think (and this shouldn't be taken as absolute truth without question, because I'm not sure how correct it is) that because the blood is so dilute, water moves into cells to balance out the concentrations of water (the water potential) in and out of the cells. This is particularly dangerous in the brain, where water moving into the brain cells from the dilute blood causes the brain to swell. This means excessive pressure is put on the brain, and the victim can go into a coma, or die.

This happens sometimes with people who have taken ecstasy - they're told to drink, but the drug causes repetitive actions, and they drink so much that water poisoning (hyponatremia) occurs.

So, to (finally) answer your question...I think people with a faster metabolism would replace the electrolytes in their blood faster, so it would take more water, faster to kill them. I'm not sure how significant the difference would be, though, between people with slow and fast metabolisms.

[biomass62583]

Also I think the question needs to be more speficific regarding what metabolic pathway, one metabolic reaction may be faster than the other, in regards to a particular person ( i.e. digestion of lipids, glucose, etc. ) which in some form could either cause the undesired effect occur slower or quicker

[dukekim0]

Increasing the concentration of water will have impact on many different organ systems such as the cardiovascular system (affecting total peripheral resistance), urinary system (kidneys will be affected by levels of aldosterone and ADH along with changes in renin), pulmonary system (blood pH would go down affecting respiration), and endocrine system (decrease in ADH secretion), etc. Unless you want the details on how it will affect a particular system, I think a comprehensive answer will be too long.