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Health Nugget of the Week

Posted on January 25, 2012 by Trisha

How to Choose Your Mineral Supplement

Choosing a proper mineral supplement can be overwhelming. The challenge is trying to choose a supplement that contains what you need and which has nutrients in an easy to digest form.  After all, what’s the point of taking a supplement if you aren’t going to absorb the nutrients in it?

Minerals, as with other nutrients, are generally more easily absorbed when they are from natural sources. Natural sources are great because your body recognizes it more as a “food” and they contain all trace minerals as opposed to using a tablet manufactured in a lab. There are many excellent natural sourced, whole food mineral supplements on the market, two of my personal favorites are LeafSource and Umac-Core.

If you are purchasing a supplement that has been formulated with multiple minerals, Chelate and Citrate are two terms you want to look for.  Chelated means the nutrient is firmly attached to an amino acid, fatty acid, or other organic compound so that they do not separate in the digestive tract which enhances their absorption.  A mineral in chelated form can increase absorption by up to 10 times!  When taken with a meal, minerals are usually automatically chelated in the stomach during digestion, however those of us with digestive disturbances, and the elderly, do not produce enough enzymes so this chelating process does not work as well as it should.

Why take minerals?

Minerals play a vital role in nearly all body reactions.  They enhance the proper utilization of vitamins and other nutrients and function as co-enzymes and enable the body to perform life sustaining functions (energy, growth, healing).

Why do we need mineral supplements?  Our body can’t manufacture minerals and our soil doesn’t contain as much essential minerals as it once did, therefore our foods are not as nutrient dense as they once were.  Processed foods, which are a staple today’s society, do not contain as much nutrition. The mass production of food that we tend to rely on results in premature harvesting so our produce do not reach peak of nutrition.

 

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