Around 54 million Americans have osteoporosis or are at risk of developing it, and many other people are dealing with bone and teeth loss due to age, poor nutrition, and even gut health. Most people don’t consider gut health when they think of osteoporosis and other bone issues, but it can actually play a large role. More and more research is confirming that almost everything is connected to the gut, so let’s see how poor gut health can contribute to bone loss and osteoporosis.
Nutrition
Good nutrition is the key to good health, but very few people consistently get enough nutrients. The vitamin and mineral content of produce has been decreasing throughout the last few decades, and some studies have found you must eat six to eight times as much of the same fruit to get the nutrition you would have gotten from one serving just fifty years ago. With most people struggling to eat even one serving of fruits or vegetables a day, you can see how easy it is to get nutritional deficiencies. This is one of the reasons why we believe so strongly in supplements. You can still get some nutrients from fruits and vegetables, and it is still important to eat them, but it’s difficult to get enough vitamins and minerals from food grown today, this is why supplementing with certain vitamins and minerals is often necessary for optimal health.
Calcium and Vitamin K
When you think of bone health you probably think of calcium, but calcium is not as important to bone health as many people think. Calcium is only one of several things you need to build and maintain strong bones, and getting too much calcium without the other necessary vitamins and minerals can actually be harmful. Having too much calcium in your blood may contribute to the development of atherosclerosis by hardening areas of plaque in your arteries, which also leads to an increased risk of heart attacks. High calcium levels may also weaken your bones, and increase your risk of developing kidney stones. However, getting enough vitamin K in your diet through food and/or supplements may help prevent calcium from damaging your arteries by keeping calcium in your bones, and keeping it out of blood vessel, but it’s difficult to get enough vitamin K through diet alone, and elevated calcium levels are a fairly common issue. This is why it’s important to get blood work done every six months to a year to ensure your calcium levels are staying within a healthy range.
Calcium and Magnesium
Magnesium also plays an important role in bone health (osteoporosis is a listed side effect of magnesium deficiency) by helping calcium get absorbed, this is why calcium-magnesium supplements are recommended more often than supplements containing just calcium. Without enough magnesium, calcium can end up not getting absorbed into the bones properly, which can cause it to accumulate in joints and certain areas of soft tissue, potentially leading to a type of arthritis. Magnesium deficiency is fairly common (deficiencies in general quite common today), and may cause symptoms like irregular heartbeat, muscle cramps, fatigue, muscle twitches, weakness, high blood pressure, etc. Magnesium is also essential for heart health, and many people have reported better sleep, less heart palpitations, less anxiety and depression, and fewer muscle cramps after supplementing with magnesium.
Vitamin D
Vitamin D is another vitamin that’s necessary for bone health, among many other things. Almost every patient we see has a vitamin D deficiency. Vitamin D deficiencies can be caused by little time spent in the sun, poor diet, and poor nutrient absorption. Vitamin D is necessary for the proper absorption of calcium and for maintaining healthy levels of calcium and phosphate. Supplementing with Vitamin D may help improve bone and tooth health, immune system function, and thyroid function.
What About Gut Health?
After all this talk of the nutrients you need for bone health, you may be wondering what your gut has to do with it, but it’s also very important. Your stomach and intestines are responsible for digestion, nutrient absorption, and waste elimination, but if one or more of these processes are not optimal, you can end up suffering from bone loss and other issues. Here’s why: Your stomach must be able to break down foods into nutrients, but most people don’t have enough digestive enzymes, or enough stomach acid to properly break down their food. If food isn’t broken down correctly, your body cannot absorb all of the nutrients. So, you could be eating tons of organic fruits and vegetables, grass-fed meat, and good fats, but still be suffering from deficiencies. This is why we stress the importance of taking digestive enzymes with each meal, so your body can break the food down and actually absorb what it needs to. You can increase stomach ac
Low stomach acid is another common cause of poor nutrient absorption. Without enough stomach acid, your body cannot properly break down food. Symptoms of low stomach acid can include heartburn, bloating, gas, diarrhea, dry skin, hair loss, skin rashes, leaky gut syndrome, and several others. Many people think that their heartburn/acid reflux is caused by too much stomach acid, but it is often found to be caused by too little stomach acid. Low stomach acid can be a complicated problem to explain and treat, but supplementing with betaine and pepsin is a great way to combat it.
Supplements
We have several supplements for bone health, osteoporosis, and digestion. These include:
- K-Force – contains vitamin D and vitamin K that work together to ensure calcium is absorbed properly.
- Calcium-Magnesium – Contains calcium and magnesium which work together to ensure the calcium is absorbed into the bones.
- Strontium – Contains strontium which may work together with calcium to increase bone density, and may help slow bone loss.
- OsteoBase – Essentially a multivitamin for your bones; contains vitamin D, vitamin K, calcium, phoshporus, and magnesium.https://www.greenwisdomhealth.com/product/strontium-60ct/
- Ortho Digestzyme – Digestive enzymes containing betaine, pepsin, bromelain and several other things that may aid in the breakdown of foods, and may help increase stomach acid.
- Innate 50-14 – Probiotic containing 14 different strains of bacteria, and 50 billion total bacteria in each capsule that may help improve overall gut health and immune system function.
Fortunately, many of the things that contribute to bone loss and osteoporosis can be lessened through diet and lifestyle changes, and supplementing with the correct nutrients. So, eat a well-rounded diet, exercise often, and take your supplements!
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