Digestive Enzymes are small proteins that help break down food that you ingest so that the nutrients can be digested and absorbed.
For example, you’re probably familiar with the term lactose intolerance, which is a deficiency of the digestive enzyme lactase. People who are lactose intolerant are unable to properly digest dairy products and therefore must supplement with lactase enzymes or avoid dairy to avoid digestive problems.
Have you ever had an upset stomach after eating something that you thought was healthy? Do you avoid certain foods because they seem to trigger IBS? When you suffer from gastrointestinal problems, doing normal things like going out to dinner at a nice restaurant can feel miserable rather than fun. If you have ever dealt with this, you are not alone. According to the International Foundation for Gastrointestinal Disorders, 10-20 percent of the world’s population suffers from IBS symptoms.
Maybe you don’t suffer from any unpleasant symptoms but you’ve been supplementing for years with vitamins and minerals and you don’t see a noticeable difference. This could be due to a lack of proper digestion and malabsorption of nutrients.
Did you know that everything we eat depends on digestive enzymes? I recommend digestive enzymes to my patients because we are only as healthy as the things we absorb! Digestive enzyme deficiency is not recognized in conventional medicine, but at Opus we have identified it in patients suffering from malnourishment, autoimmune dis-ease, and chronic digestive problems.
Symptoms of Digestive Enzyme Deficiency
- Constipation
- Diarrhea
- Gas
- Bloating
- Indigestion
- Reflux after meals
- Undigested food in stools
When you eat, immediately your saliva begins working to break down the food. The act of chewing signals your stomach to produce Hydrochloric Acid (HCL) which breaks down proteins. Then, a signal is sent to your pancreas to release digestive enzymes such as amylases (breaks down carbs), lipases (breaks down fats), proteases and peptidases (breaks down proteins). Even the small intestine has enzymes that continue working to process simple sugars.
However, for many people things don’t go as smoothly as designed. Due to chronic stress, excessive toxins, and poor diets, the stomach, intestines and pancreas can become deficient in digestive enzymes and lose their ability to work properly.
Conventional medicine fails many people in this important health issue because if you are not severely deficient, they label you as normal. In functional medicine however, we investigate the range of levels and understand that normal doesn’t equal optimal.
Our goal is to restore your digestive system to optimal levels and help you maintain it so that you’re actually absorbing all of the nutrients you need from your food and supplements allowing your body to heal itself naturally. Sometimes, we recommend taking IV Vitamin infusions to quickly restore your nutrient levels, while you are working on gut healing. IV Vitamin infusions bypass the digestive system and deliver nutrients directly into your bloodstream, making them 100 percent bioavailable. Gut healing is not an overnight process, it takes time to reduce gut lining permeability and to get your microflora healthy again. Additionally, taking digestive enzymes helps acutely to relieve many of the root causes of my patients health concerns such as SIBO, leaky gut, candidiasis, chronic inflammation, and problems that arise from being malnourished.
If you are experiencing signs of digestive enzyme deficiency near Austin, TX please call us to schedule an appointment. We will help you by conducting a thorough consultation, medical testing, and a personalized care plan to heal the root cause of your concerns.
References:
International Foundation for Gastrointestinal Disorders. 24 Nov. 2016. https://www.aboutibs.org/facts-about-ibs.html
Disclaimer: The information contained in this post is not medical advice. Please call and speak to Dr. Santiago or Dr. Brandon before beginning any supplements or treatments.
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