Supplements

High quality supplements will be absorbed and utilized by your body.   Inferior products – not so much.   Purchasing high quality supplements is money well spent.  Spending your hard-earned money on inferior supplements is money wasted – or, as they say, expensive urine.

So how do you tell if your supplements are worth the money spent?  Read the Supplement Facts on the back of the bottle.  This is your first indication as to whether or not the manufacturer has chosen to use high quality, bio-available forms of each of the vitamins and minerals listed.

Vitamins and minerals can come in many different forms.  For example, magnesium.  Magnesium is extremely important for the body.  Your heart can’t function without it.  You need it to absorb calcium for bone health.  It is essential to convert carbs, proteins, and fats into energy.  It helps reduce the very damaging effects of stress.  Magnesium is responsible for over 300 reactions in the body.  So don’t you want the best, most absorbable, bio-available form of magnesium you can find?

Here’s what I do.  When I scan the Supplement Facts of a brand of supplements, I single out just a few of the vitamins and minerals (including magnesium) to see what form the manufacturer is using.  If I don’t like what I see I can generally assume I won’t like the rest of the ingredient list.  So I move on to the next brand.

A few of the key nutrients I focus on are calcium, magnesium, folate, and B12.

Here’s what I look for:

• I prefer calcium to be in the form of either aspartate, malate, or ascorbate.  Not carbonate.
• I prefer magnesium to be in the form of either malate, citrate, or aspartate.  Not oxide.
• I prefer folate to be in the form of 5-methyl-tetrahydrofolate (5-MTHF).   Folate (a B vitamin) is the form that is naturally found in foods.  Folic acid is the synthetic version found in most supplements.
• I prefer B12 to be in the form of methylcobalamin vs cyanocobalamin.

By just scanning the ingredient list for these four and finding them in the form I prefer tells me that the manufacturer is working hard to make the most absorbable, bio-available product they can.

I have yet to find high quality supplements in the big box stores (Costco, Walmart, Target) or the large chain pharmacies.  A health food store is your best bet.

Or better yet, look for a pharmaceutical grade, third-party tested, GMP certified supplement.  These top of the line supplements are most often found in health care clinics that practice holistic or functional medicine.

Need help choosing a good supplement?  I can help by suggesting brands that meet the above standards.  Please go to my contact page and send me an email.  We can discuss your particular needs.