Collagen is a building block of life and the most abundant protein in the body. Your joints, ligaments, cartilage, blood vessels and connective tissues are made from this protein. About 30% of the total protein in your body is collagen! As you get older, your collagen production slows and decreases but we can use supplementation to improve your health in many areas...
There are 28 known types of collagen, with type I collagen accounting for 90% of the collagen in the human body1. Type 1 collagen is responsible for tissue repair, immune response, cellular communication and cellular migration.
As your body ages, it produces less collagen. In fact, you start slowly losing collagen at around thirty years of age and it continues to decrease!
What reduces collagen further?
- Smoking (the most obvious one!)
- Alcohol consumption
- A diet high in added sugar and processed foods
- Excessive sun exposure or sun beds
- Lack of sleep
- Insufficient exercise
Best food for collagen production
You can support your skin’s ability to make collagen by feeding and nourishing it with the right ingredients. It is naturally found only in animal flesh, however, a variety of both animal and plant foods contain materials for collagen production in our own bodies3. Foods that contain collagen include the skin, bones, tendons, and ligaments of;
- Chicken
- Fish
- Beef
- Lamb
- Pork
- Eggs
- Organ meats like liver, intestines and kidneys
- A high-quality collagen supplement
A meta-review of 19 studies with 1,125 participants (95% women) between the ages of 20 and 70 found that taking hydrolyzed collagen improves the quality of participants skin2.
McDowells Products
McDowells Collagen
This supplement contains smaller pre-digested peptides compared to those found in other proteins, allowing them to be absorbed by the body more rapidly than intact proteins, thus maximising nutrient delivery to cells. This greater bio-availability makes McDowells Phytoceuticals Beef Collagen Hydrolysate ideal when used for health and beauty treatments.
Nxgen Beef Intestines
Intestines, stomach (tripe) and other gelatinous parts provided concentrated amounts of connective tissue, gelatin / collagen, probiotics and other gut-specific proteins that are now absent from the modern diet. Dr. Royal Lee, and other early nutritional pioneers, believed the degenerative processes of a specific organ / gland could be reversed by ingesting the corresponding raw materials specific to that organ/gland.
Nxgen Beef Marrow
Bone Matrix Marrow is rich in nutrients growth factors, stem cells, soluble activators, collagen vitamins, minerals, enzymes and trace minerals found only in marrow bones that build, repair and maintain living bones and connective tissue.
References
1. Current Insights into Collagen Type I
2. Effects of hydrolyzed collagen supplementation on skin aging: a systematic review and meta-analysis
3. The Harvard Nutrition Source - Collagen
