Reading the source
Your household water is one of the inputs behind that number
Hard and softened water carry opposite mineral profiles, and the difference lands on the same side of the report as the adrenal ratios.
The distinction in the literature is clean:
Softening works by exchanging the hardness minerals for sodium. That is the whole mechanism, and it is why the two profiles sit on opposite sides of the same axis.
Sodium is not a standalone figure. It appears in the ratios that carry most of the interpretation: Na/K (ideal 2.4, acceptable 1.4 to 3.4) and Na/Mg (ideal 4, acceptable 2 to 6).
Na/K is also the ratio the stress stages are read from, so anything nudging sodium moves a reading that is being used for something else entirely. That is the practical reason to know what comes out of your tap.
Water is one input among many. Diet, adrenal activity and mineral handling all contribute to a sodium figure, and the report does not label which contribution came from where.
What knowing your water does is stop you over-reading a single number. A sodium result in a softened-water household is worth interpreting with that fact in hand rather than in ignorance of it.
Worth telling the practitioner. Whether your household is on hard water, softened water or well water is the kind of context that changes how a sodium figure is read. It costs nothing to mention and it is rarely asked.
There is a second, separate way water reaches the reading: the sample. Samples are analysed unwashed, because washing removes over 90% of sodium and potassium. Shampoos, conditioners and dyes should be noted on the request form.
So the instruction is not "wash it in bottled water" — it is to leave the sample alone and record what has been used on it.
I ask about the water because the answer is often "we put a softener in about a year ago" and nobody had connected the two. It does not explain a whole report, but it stops me reading a sodium figure as though it arrived from nowhere.
Where a household has softened water I want to know whether the drinking tap is on the softened line or bypassed. Plenty of installations bypass the kitchen cold tap, and then the exposure is bathing rather than drinking — a different picture again.
Softened water is sodium-dominant and reads to the stimulatory side, so it is a genuine input. It is context for interpreting the number rather than a sole explanation of it.
Neither is better. Hard water is calcium and magnesium dominant and reads to the sedative side; softened water is sodium dominant and reads to the stimulatory side. They are different profiles, not a ranking.
Yes. Household water type is useful context, as are any shampoos, conditioners or dyes, which belong on the request form.
A full hair tissue mineral analysis reports sodium alongside the ratios it belongs to, so the number is interpreted rather than read alone.
Published 2026-08-30 · Updated 2026-08-30
By Eileen Durfee — Practitioner, NBS (Nutritional Balancing Science), NASM-CPT; wellness educator, inventor and author.
These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Hair tissue mineral analysis is a screening test and is not diagnostic; anything medical belongs with your own licensed provider. Wellness Shopping Online is operated by Nuco Enterprise Solutions LLC.
