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Eating with kidney disease: salt, liquids, phosphorus, potassium, protein, and a dietitian
For an adult with chronic kidney disease (CKD), at any stage or on dialysis, and for the people who shop and cook with them. It passes on, by name, what the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK, part of the NIH) says: why food matters, the seven things to know, sodium and liquids, phosphorus and potassium, protein, calories and heart-healthy fats, and medical nutrition therapy with a registered dietitian (and when Medicare covers it). It builds the questions to ask and prints a card for your own numbers. Nothing is saved.
A word with a dotted line under it, like this, opens its official definition, quoted from a U.S. government glossary.
Right now
- New swelling in your face, arms, legs or belly? NIDDK says to contact your health care professional. Ours: call the same day.
- Trouble breathing, chest pain, fainting, or a heartbeat that feels very weak or very uneven? Call 911 (ours).
- Thoughts of suicide, or all too much? Call or text 988, any hour, free (ours).
More help
- On this site: When it’s your kidneys · High blood pressure · Mineral and bone disorder in kidney disease · Anemia in kidney disease · Kidneys, bladder and urine: find the right page.
- Dialysis and kidney failure: Hemodialysis · Peritoneal dialysis · Kidney failure · Paying for kidney failure treatment. Food: Food portions · When you need food · When blood sugar goes too low or too high.
- When it is hard to pay: When you need a doctor and can’t pay. Getting ready: Get ready for your appointment · How your kidneys work.
- In an emergency: Help right now (988, 911). All our free tools.
Kidneys, bladder or urine, and not sure this is the right page? The pages on this site for bladder infections, kidney stones, blood in the urine, bladder pain, bladder leaks, the prostate, kidney disease and bedwetting, on one list.
Other guides on this site that go with this page
Free to read. We chose these ourselves; no professional did. Each guide was written with AI and has not been reviewed by a professional. They are general information, not advice.
- Feeding a child with kidney disease: calories, protein, salt, potassium, phosphorus, vitamins, liquids, and babies: feeding a baby, child or teenager with chronic kidney disease (CKD): calories and growth, feeding tubes, protein and dialysis, sodium (less for some children, more for others), potassium, phosphorus and binders, why store-bought vitamins are not safe, liquids, babies and formula, and the lab reports.
This page and its wording were written with AI (Claude) for Scarlet Beast (our AI policy). No doctor, nurse or dietitian has reviewed it. The facts were read on October 21, 2026 on NIDDK’s (NIH) page Healthy Eating for Adults with Chronic Kidney Disease (last reviewed January 2025, so some advice may have changed since). The one number (no more than 2,300 milligrams of sodium a day for adults, from the 2020–2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans) and the label rule (20% Daily Value or more is high, 5% or less is low) are as NIDDK gives them, and we add none. We name only the kinds of medicine NIDDK names (a phosphate binder, a potassium binder) and give no doses. Ours: calling the provider the same day about new swelling; the 911 line; never stopping a medicine or a binder on your own; asking for your own numbers; the note that some tips pull in different directions; 988; the questions to ask; the card; the links to our other pages; and the order of the steps. What we left out: NIDDK’s section on research studies and its reference. NIDDK’s children’s page is linked, not summed up. Nothing you tick or type here is saved or sent.