For years, many have struggled to know why some dietary dietary supplements, elements of meals, even medicine clearly exerted helpful well being results—however weren’t absorbed by the gastrointestinal (GI) tract). Some compounds with substantial well being advantages are utterly inert in people, ingested after which flushed down the bathroom.
Take curcumin, for instance. This part of the spice, turmeric, taken orally is nearly fully unabsorbed. In case you took 100 mg of curcumin, 99 mg or so is undigested, unprocessed, unmetabolized by your GI digestive course of and handed out in a bowel motion. But the proof is obvious: curcumin reduces measures of irritation corresponding to C-reactive protein, reduces arthritis ache, and exerts metabolic advantages corresponding to diminished blood sugar and triglycerides. Many efforts have due to this fact been made to attempt to drive absorption of curcumin to extend efficacy: mixed with piperine, bioperine, nanoparticle emulsions, surfactants, chelating brokers, and others. Absorption can certainly be elevated, although nobody has but demonstrated a rise in helpful results with enhanced absorption.
Take into account this: Curcumin has additionally been proven to extend intestinal mucus manufacturing and the intestinal immune response, explaining why curcumin, working throughout the GI tract, improves the intestinal barrier to entry of bacterial breakdown merchandise. This may increasingly clarify why curcumin has been proven to scale back endotoxemia, i.e., the entry of bacterial lipopolysaccharide toxin into the bloodstream, explaining why curcumin reduces body-wide irritation, reduces measures of irritation like C-reactive protein, reduces arthritis ache, and improves metabolic measures corresponding to blood sugar and triglycerides. Curcumin additionally modifies bacterial species composition of intestine flora, decreasing fecal species of Proteobacteria (e.g., E. coli, Klebsiella, and different fecal microbes) and Enterococcus. Do you see the place I’m going with this? If curcumin is understood to exert necessary results throughout the GI tract, then possibly you do NOT wish to drive absorption and also you need most focus throughout the intestines, not within the bloodstream.
There are different compounds which have helpful results but are poorly-absorbed or not absorbed in any respect, corresponding to:
- Berberine—Exerting most of the similar advantages as curcumin however with larger antibacterial and antifungal results. It additionally boosts Akkermansia numbers within the GI tract, a serious determinant of metabolic well being.
- Inexperienced tea catechins—Related to weight reduction, discount of hysteria, improved cognitive perform, and different helpful results. Inexperienced tea catechins are identified to crosslink mucin proteins inside intestinal mucus, changing it to a much less liquid to a extra gel-like, much less penetrable, consistency.
- Capsaicin—That is the part of peppers that’s accountable for the recent feeling within the mouth. Capsaicin helps “mildew” the microbial composition of bowel flora rising, for example, necessary species corresponding to Faecalibacterium prausniztrii, the primary producer of butyrate that mediates a protracted checklist of well being advantages for people.
- Quercetin—Quercetin is a flavonoid sourced from meals corresponding to apples, onions, broccoli, and inexperienced tea. Whereas quite a lot of necessary well being advantages have been documented, quercetin could also be particularly helpful in bettering insulin responses and decreasing blood sugar, though there may be minimal absorption.
You’ll be able to recognize that there was loads of wasted effort in making an attempt to plan methods to extend absorption, when the true advantages might derive from NOT being absorbed and exerting results on the GI microbiome, the intestinal mucus and immune obstacles, and endotoxemia. You can too recognize that there’s a lot of promoting occurring to advertise gross sales of variations of, say, curcumin, with enhanced absorption which will show to be much less efficient than non-absorbable kinds. It highlights the big function that the GI microbiome and GI tract play in quite a few human well being situations. In a future DrDavisInfiniteHealth.com weblog submit, I shall talk about all of the methods that you could simply, safely, inexpensively, successfully reap the benefits of methods that enhance your GI intestinal barrier and cut back endotoxemia to acquire large well being advantages and ignore loads of pointless or deceptive advertising and marketing efforts.
