Digestive enzymes

Digestive enzymes: The spark of life.

Enzymes are protein based substances found in every cell of every living plant and animal. They are the catalysts of every chemical reaction in the body.

Digestive enzymes role is obviously ‘digestion’ of our foods.

Most enzymes work by helping take something apart, ’cutting’ or ‘lysing’. When you eat your hamburger, your enzymes need to cut the proteins, the fat and the carbohydrates to small units before the bowels absorb them.
Enzymes are of different types and substance specific. Not all enzymes are created equal!

How enzymes are named?

Enzymes are named based for the substance that they work on and break down. The suffix “-ase” is then affixed to the end of the word.

• Protease breaks down proteins to simple amino-acids. We use on regular basis meat softener on meats, which is a protease!
• Lipase breaks down proteins to simple fatty acids.
• Amylase breaks down carbohydrates to simple sugars.
• Lactase breaks down lactose.
• Cellulase breaks down cellulose.

What happens when you are deficient of digestive enzymes?

• Indigestion: The food that you eat sits like a wood piece in your stomach instead of being digested, which predispose you to heart burns and feeling of indigestion, frequent belching. The food arrives to your bowels and the nutrients are not well absorbed. Then, your food arrives to the colon where the bacteria ferments it and subsequently you start suffering from bloating, gas, abdominal pain and diarrhea. This process actually affects bowel movements and subsequently detoxification role of the digetive system.

• Immunologic challenges: The partially digested animal proteins are highly allergenic and cause many types of food allergies. One of the classic diseases is "Celiac disease" which is due to inappropriate digestion of gluten, which triggers an antoimmune reaction against the intestinal cells.

Why do we get deficiency of digestive enzymes?Typically, fresh vegetables and fruits are full of enzymes.

Unfortunately most of our food is enzymes depleted by:

• Cooking
• Milling and refining
• Food preservatives
• Drying
• Canning
• Freezing
• Irradiation
• Food additives
• Preservatives
• Coloring agents
• Flavoring
• Pesticides

What is the solution for digestive enzyme deficiencies?

• Avoid enzyme-depleted foods, which is not as easy as you may imagine!

• Maximize your enzyme intake by eating enzyme-rich food such as Yogurt, Kefir, Miso, Tempeh, and cheese.

• Enzyme supplements: Pick an enzyme supplement that is broad range that helps you digest proteins, fats and carbohydrates (protease, lipase, amylase, lactase and cellulase).

Enzymes supplements for systemic benefits:

Enzymes can be used also for systemic benefits. In order to get systemic benefits, digestive enzymes should be taken between meals and at high doses because small amount are only absorbed into the blood stream.

Enzymes are used systemically as anti-inflammatories for joint health, other enzymes such as nattokinase is used for cardiac health; others are used to boost anti-oxidant activity.

Medically speaking, potent enzymes are used intravenously to dissolve blood clots in case of heart attacks, they are given by medical doctors under strict supervision.

What your doctor may not know about digestive enzymes?

Allopathic medical doctors acknowledge severe digestive enzymes deficiencies only. They acknowledge severe cases due to severe pancreatic diseases, usually secondary to chronic alcoholism. They will not recognize the frequent relative deficiency in most people.

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