Our bodies require oxygen, water, minerals and nutrients. The water, minerals and nutrients are derived from what we eat and drink. The more our food is raw, organic, fresh and unprocessed, the better the absorption of minerals and nutrients we require. Many people use nutritional supplements to make sure they are getting the vitamins and minerals that they are missing in their diet.
The use of nutritional supplements has been around for a long time. The development of the concept of vitamins goes back to around 1912 and is generally credited to Casimir Funk a Polish biochemist. Dr. Forrest C. Shaklee was an associate of Casimir Funk and created “Shaklee’s Vitalized Minerals” in 1915.
Studies are now showing that our food does not contain the minerals and nutrients as it once did. This can be attributed to over-farming of the soil and processing of the food. This fact supports the use of nutritional supplements as well as having our own garden and buying produce from local organic farmers when we can.
There has been some controversy over if it matters what type of vitamins we use. Is one just as good as another? The following is a brief description of the three types of supplements.
Synthetic – man-made contains inorganic substances, no enzymes, can produce side-effects
Natural isolate/organic extract – low quality, weak enzymes, uses chemicals in processing.
Natural made – highest quality raw food materials, strong enzymatic action retained, exceptional bio-availability at cell level, backed by science.
There was a study done by the University of California-Berkley, called the Landmark Study. This independent study compared people who used a natural made vitamin, to people who used synthetic types and to those who used no supplements at all. The study concluded that those who used the natural type supplement lived long with fewer health problems.
The study indicated that individuals who used natural supplements had longer telomeres. Telomere length is an indicator of health and longevity, and for those individuals they were much longer. Wikipedia defines the telomere as this: “A telomere is a region of repetitive nucleotide sequences at each end of a chromosome, which protects the end of the chromosome from deterioration or from fusion with neighboring chromosomes. Its name is derived from the Greek nouns telos (τέλος) “end” and merοs (μέρος, root: μερ-) “part”. “
The study also showed that those who used no supplements were found on average to have better health that those who used synthetic supplements. To summarize,
People who used natural supplements – best health on average
People who used no supplements – next best health on average
People who used synthetic supplements – least healthy on average
In addition to supplement effectiveness, the purity has to be also considered. Supplements are no different that foods or herbs in that they can contain impurities, pesticides and other chemicals.
We strive to achieve proper nutrition through organic products with minimal processing and use natural type supplements that are pure from a company that we can trust. We hope you find this post to be interesting and a benefit in the topic of proper nutrition.
Donna’s Tip: The term natural is used quite a bit know a days and can mean a lot of things. Based on this we always read the label and research the manufacture as required.
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