Why Digestive Health Is Essential To Overall Health
We often tend to think of our body’s many systems—digestive, immune, circulatory, neurologic—like workstations on an assembly line, each contributing separately to our overall health and function. But, in fact, these systems are far more interconnected with multiple channels of communication, feedback, and gatekeeping. It is this delicate web that helps us maintain both health and homeostasis—a stable equilibrium in a continually changing environment.
One essential hub for all this activity and intercommunication is the gut. Not only does the gut process the vast majority of our life-sustaining nutrients, it also serves as a modulating influence on our bodies’ many other systems.
Let’s look at a few ways that the gut governs overall health.
Digestion and Motility
The naturally occurring “good bacteria” that reside within the gut’s complex ecosystem help process vital nutrients. These bacteria also help govern gut motility and serve as gatekeepers, helping to choose which molecules are allowed to move through the gut’s permeable membranes and into the system, and which are removed as waste.
Immune Health
About 70% of our immune system resides in the gut. The mucosal membrane of the gut is a vital barrier against potentially harmful microbes and environmental toxins, and it is here that those “good bacteria” we mentioned earlier play such an essential role, competing with “bad” or potentially harmful bacteria for key receptors, and helping to maintain the integrity of the mucosal barrier.
Skin Health
The skin is an essential barrier against sun, wind, toxins, and invading microbes. It is also a complex environment where “good” and “bad” bacteria wage a daily battle for control. “Good bacteria” work not only on the skin surface but also within the gut to help support skin health. Factors such as cellular rejuvenation and replacement, skin moisture and resistance to environmental stressors like sun exposure and UV radiation are governed largely by gut flora.
Neurologic and Emotional Health
The gut’s influence on neurologic health have spurred some to refer to the gut as a “second brain,” and in fact, mood-influencing chemicals like serotonin are produced in significant quantities by the gut. The connection between the gut and out neurologic function, termed “the gut-brain axis,” influences not only or central nervous system (responsible for mood), but also our neuro-endocrine system including our hypothalamic and pituitary function.
How Probiotics Can Help
Gut health—and overall health—depend on maintaining a healthy balance of gut flora. Dietary supplementation with robust probiotic strains can reinforce our bodies’ natural population of “good” bacteria, which can be vital when you consider the many ways our systems are challenged by stressors, fatigue, poor diet, pollutants, and environmental factors.
At Probulin®, we understand how the body’s many systems are interconnected. Our probiotic products are specifically designed to help support gut health and thus promote an overall balance that benefits each of our bodies’ systems.
Probulin® products are certified to be free of GMOs, wheat, gluten, magnesium stearate, and phthalates (used by some manufacturers in the enteric coating of delayed-release capsules).
Let Probulin® help you keep your life in balance.