Can Dehydration Cause Coughing?
Published December 2, 2022
Dehydration causes a variety of issues in the human body. Weakness, headaches, and light-headedness are some of its common symptoms. Interestingly, despite dehydration having a lot to do with the mouth, coughing doesn’t seem to be a common symptom, at least not according to most medical websites.
So, can dehydration cause coughing? Read on as this article goes over several things you need to know about the correlation between dehydration and coughing. Let’s start by answering that question right away.
Can Dehydration Cause Coughing?
No, according to studies, dehydration doesn’t directly cause coughing.
However, it does increase the chances or likelihood of someone coughing for different reasons. If a person is sick or ill, for example, it’s not guaranteed that coughing will be one of their symptoms.
But if they don’t drink water regularly while they’re sick, the chances of coughing becoming one of their symptoms will increase. So, to conclude, coughing is more prevalent in people who are dehydrated.
That doesn’t necessarily mean dehydration causes coughing. But how does it work, exactly?
Why Does Dehydration Increase Your Chances of Coughing?
To start with, it’s important to understand that dehydration doesn’t always increase your chances of coughing. But in the cases that it does, it’s because if you don’t drink fluids sufficiently, or in other words, hydrate yourself, the mucus your airways generate would become sticky as opposed to watery.
Since sticky mucus doesn’t drain quickly, it’ll irritate your throat once it reaches that point. The itch that comes from your throat may then provoke a cough, thereby making it seem dehydration causes coughing.
The good news is that this usually doesn’t happen because your airways don’t generate too much mucus anyway. That means there’s no mucus build-up happening at any point in time, so coughing is unlikely.
The only time this could happen is when you’re sick, infected, or affected by your allergies. That’s because, during these times, the airways produce more mucus than usual, resulting in the build-up.
Besides, if you’re constantly dehydrated, coughing is the least of your worries.
Other Effects of Dehydration
As stated earlier, dehydration can cause a variety of issues to the body. Common examples include:
- Extreme thirst
- Rapid heartbeat
- Dizziness
- Not passing urine
- Lethargic or extreme fatigue
- Confusion
- Dry eyes, mouth, and lips
These may not necessarily be fatal, but they can be pretty annoying. But now that you’ve determined that dehydration doesn’t directly cause coughing, then why do people sometimes cough uncontrollably?
If Not Dehydration, What’s Causing Your Coughing?
If it’s not dehydration, and you’re also not sick, yet the extent to which you’re coughing is still off the charts, it’s likely because of one of the following reasons:
- You smoke regularly.
- You have a viral infection either on your sinuses or throat.
- You’re being exposed to allergens.
- There are currently a lot of irritants like dust or fumes in the air.
- You’re having an asthma attack.
- You’re experiencing acid reflux.
- You took a medication that has coughing as one of its side effects.
These are some examples of explanations for why you’re coughing uncontrollably despite you not having an apparent health problem. But then again, if the thought that dehydration might’ve been the cause of the problem occurred to you, it might be a sign that you’re not exactly the best at hydrating yourself.
4 Tips To Hydrate Yourself
Everyone knows that hydrating oneself is crucial. But it’s not like just about anyone can do it consistently. There are issues that can hinder a person’s ability to drink lots of fluids during their daily routine.
In that case, the following tips should help:
1. Drink Lots of Water First Thing in the Morning
You might forget about some parts of your daily routine, but what you’ve planned to do for the first few minutes of each day is something that sticks in your mind. If you make it a habit to drink water right away when you wake up, it’ll be difficult to get rid of that habit even if you try.
2. Invest in a Big Water Bottle
One of the issues with hydration is that it requires you to stand up every time to pick up a glass, go to the kitchen, and pour water into it. That can sometimes be a lot of work for someone who’s often busy.
If that sounds like too much hassle, you can invest in a big water bottle.
With it, you no longer have to do a lot of work every time you want to have a drink. Instead, you can do it just once. If you invest in a two-liter tumbler, that’s all the water you’ll ever need for the entire day.
3. Set Up Alarms
If you’re not exactly too lazy to get up from your chair to fetch yourself a glass of water, then perhaps your main issue is you simply forget that you haven’t had a drink in a while. In that case, you can use your phone to set up alarms for whenever you need to drink a glass of water.
4. Drink Lots of Water After Every Meal
You can also make it a habit to drink lots of water after every meal. Not just enough water to drain the food you just ate, but instead a bit more than usual. It may make you feel more full, but drinking several milliliters more water after every meal can go a long way in making sure you don’t get dehydrated.
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About The Author
Lenard Arceo is an experienced writer who enjoys learning to code in his spare time. He has a fascination with health and nutrition and enjoys sharing his knowledge and research. He is proud of his commitment to communicating factual content that has helped his readers with life changing choices over the years.
