Why Bone Broth?
Bone broth has recently been trending after years of being known as a "grandmother's remedy". It has gained celebrity popularity recently due to hair, skin, nails, and overall anti-aging benefits. Pro-athletes have also been supplementing with bone broth because of its ability to promote healthy bones and joints and help support healing from injuries. The key proteins found in bone broth are glycine, proline, and hydroxyproline, which support your skin, bones, organs, and digestive tract. It’s unique amino acid protein profile can help your body replenish and rebuild your connective tissue to help your aching joints. Bone broth provides the precise amounts of magnesium, calcium, potassium, sodium, and amino acids to help your body thrive at a cellular level.
Bone broth is made by boiling the bones of healthy grass-fed livestock (typically chicken or beef) for about three days. By doing this, you are extracting the beneficial bone proteins and minerals. Since many of us don’t have the time and resources to make our own homemade bone broth every week, there are other options in which you can purchase hydrolyzed collagen, which is the main beneficial compound found in both broth. Hydrolyzed collagen comes in a powder form that can easily be mixed with warm or cold water. The best source would be from grass-fed bovine. There are some supporters of fish collagen, but most of the world’s supply is coming from farmed Tilapia, which I would recommend to stay away from due to the horrible conditions that they are raised.
A typical serving is anywhere from 3 to 15 grams. More is not always better and most people think the sweet spot is around 6-10 grams of daily consumption.
Benefits:
Skin
Skin thickness can be increased by collagen supplements. In addition to the appearance of the skin being improved, it may also help to hide veins and arteries.
It’s not just the amount of collagen in the skin that is important, it’s the organization and fragmentation of the fibers that affect the appearance of skin. Skin that appears youthful has an organized pattern of cross linked fibers and few of the fibers are frayed. Skin that appears older has highly disorganized fibers that are frayed and split. Collagen supplements increase the amount of collagen fibers that are more organized and less prone to fraying. Collagen production naturally slows because of age, which can cause wrinkling. Not only does skin have less wrinkles by taking collagen supplements, studies have also suggested skin’s elasticity is improved, this translates to skin that holds onto the face more tightly with less sagging.
Inflammation
Collagen supplements have been shown to reduce inflammation throughout the body. Inflammation is reduced not only at the site of an injury, but also systemically, which is why people start feeling better internally. Collagen has shown reduction in pain for a multitude of reasons, including common conditions like arthritis. In a study comparing collagen and glucosamine, collagen was much more effective in reducing knee pain in arthritis patients than glucosamine.
Bones & Joints
Skin and bone health are related, which makes sense since they are both dependent on collagen types 1&3. Studies have found that the worse a person’s skin looks the higher risk of osteoporosis and lower bone density. Arthritis and osteoporosis are by far the most studied conditions related to collagen supplements. TMJ, fibromyalgia, and other types of joint injuries all show positive results from collagen supplements. Not only are bones built better by collagen, a study has shown collagen is protective of bone loss as well.
Because of its positive effects on building and protecting bones, collagen is great for growing children. Bone broth is also great during pregnancy because it is easy on the digestive system and provides a great source of dietary protein for keeping a healthy immune system and providing nourishment for your growing baby.
*Sports Research and Great Lakes collagen peptides are my personal favorite because they use a grass-fed cattle source and both companies have long time ethical history in the dietary supplement business.
