The above picture, A, exhibits collagen deposition (fluorescent inexperienced) in tendon tissue after stimulation by hyaluronic acid. Picture B exhibits nearly no collagen when hyaluronic acid is just not added. (From Oliva 2021 through Artistic Commons License.)
Many individuals are aware of hyaluronic acid (HA) as a topical agent, utilized by many women to enhance pores and skin hydration and clean wrinkles, given HA’s capacity to bind appreciable portions of water molecules. HA can be injected into joints to extend joint lubrication (knees, hips, shoulders), into pores and skin as a short lived filler to cut back wrinkles, administered into the colon through enema to cut back the irritation of ulcerative colitis, and utilized topically within the vagina as a lubricant. However the actual energy of hyaluronic acid comes with oral ingestion, simply because it was speculated to happen if we added again misplaced dietary sources.
Organ meats, particularly mind, kidney, coronary heart, intestines, and pores and skin, are wealthy in HA. The fashionable aversion to organ meats has due to this fact triggered a widespread lack of HA consumption that, I imagine, is inflicting accelerated getting old of pores and skin, joints, and different organs, maybe together with the mind. Lack of HA compromises the intestinal barrier to microbial byproducts and permits better intestinal and body-wide irritation.
HA content material of organs drops as we age. Age-related discount is particularly marked in pores and skin, with older individuals having as much as 90% much less dermal HA in comparison with younger individuals. HA is considerable in joints, discovered each in cartilage and within the joint lubricant, additionally lowered in amount as we age. HA can be present in beneficiant portions in human breast milk, essential for gastrointestinal maturation of the breastfeeding toddler (and yet one more deficiency of artificial toddler formulation).
It’s clear that orally-ingested HA makes its strategy to the dermal layer of pores and skin, the joint lubricating fluid in knees, hips and different joints, tendons and ligaments, the eyes, and different organs. After ingestion, HA is metabolized by intestine microbes into smaller fragments which can be absorbed and distributed all through the physique. Because the picture above demonstrates, HA stimulates collagen deposition (as does collagen supplementation, additionally).
HA additionally has prebiotic properties and has been proven to markedly improve the inhabitants of Akkermansia muciniphila, the keystone species that exerts quite a few useful metabolic results together with lowered insulin resistance, lowered blood sugar, and elevated manufacturing of intestinal mucus. One other keystone species, Faecalibacterium prausnitzii, produces elevated portions of useful fatty acids similar to butyrate when “fed” HA. Utilized orally, HA additionally reduces oral pathogens.
HA ingestion due to this fact might be anticipated to:
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- Improve pores and skin moisture and cut back wrinkle depth
- Improve joint lubrication (glycosaminoglycan and proteoglycans) and cut back arthritis ache
By the best way, if the proof demonstrating that HA, particularly when mixed with collagen hydrolysates additionally absent from the trendy eating regimen, reduces arthritis ache, will increase joint lubrication, and might improve cartilage quantity, why are docs so eager on injecting HA immediately into joints, however not on oral supplementation? Ah, properly, you’ll be able to cost cash for injections, however not for advocating an oral complement.
- Yield metabolic well being enhancements—at the least partly as a result of prebiotic fiber properties of HA
- Scale back intestinal irritation by growing the intestinal immune response
- Scale back penetrability of the gastrointestinal lining (thereby doubtless lowering endotoxemia and body-wide irritation)
- Improved wound therapeutic
In step with the consumption of one thing that ought to be a pure part of eating regimen, no adversarial results of HA have ever been reported throughout dozens of human scientific trials.
You may certainly get hold of HA by bringing organ meats again into your eating regimen. Most trendy individuals, nonetheless, discover this objectionable. On the very least, you could possibly improve HA consumption by consuming the pores and skin on poultry (NEVER boneless, skinless hen breast, the epitome of low-fat blunders!) and fish, devour sausages encased in pure casings, make soups from the carcass of animals you’ve consumed, however the complete amount ingested might be modest. Supplementation can due to this fact be the answer.
If we had been to devour the mind of an animal, we might get hold of round 7.4 grams of HA from a 4-ounce serving. A variety of HA doses have been explored however sometimes 40-240 mg per day. However is that the best consumption? That is an unanswered query, however could be value exploring. As a result of HA is so water-absorbent, small portions generate substantial hydrating results.
Picture supply: Oliva F, Marsilio E, Asparago G, Frizziero A, Berardi AC, Maffulli N. The Affect of Hyaluronic Acid on Tendon Physiology and Its Scientific Software in Tendinopathies. Cells. 2021 Nov 9;10(11):3081.
