Have you ever taken a vitamin or mineral supplement and not felt any better? Or worse, had an adverse reaction to the supplement? If so, bioavailability may be to blame.

Bioavailability measures how quickly and thoroughly your body processes substances in your diet. This is especially important for supplements, as the human body is a complex biological system that cannot process a single gram of vitamin or mineral.

In addition, bioavailability is highly dependent on the dose of your supplement, so you need to be careful about the dosage you use.

What Does Bioavailability Mean?

Bioavailability refers to how easily a substance gets into your systemic circulation (aka how it travels throughout your body) and how well it can do its job. Most vitamins and supplements are taken orally. Upon swallowing, they travel through your throat and stomach, where they are absorbed with the help of digestive juices. As the medication passes through your digestive system, it is transported to various parts of your body, including the bloodstream.

How bioavailability affects the absorption of vitamins and minerals is very important for your overall health. When you aren’t absorbing enough of your vitamins and minerals, the results will be less than optimal.

Fortunately, most supplements have bioavailability ratings to help you determine how much to take. This is particularly important for those who are sensitive to certain ingredients.

What Factors Affect Bioavailability in Food?

Bioavailability depends on, and can be affected by, several factors, including the type of food you eat, how it is prepared, what the food is paired with, the supplements you take, dosage forms, and your metabolism rate. For a person who has sensitivities or difficulties absorbing certain nutrients, these are important to consider:

• Bioavailability can be influenced by the structure of the food. Chopping food is one way to boost its absorption.
• The time it takes for a nutrient to enter your bloodstream can affect bioavailability. As these substances travel through the GI tract, they are exposed to a wide range of bodily processes and chemicals. Therefore, bioavailability can vary greatly in individuals. Men and women’s bodies react differently to different substances and age is another factor that affects bioavailability.
• Bioavailability is affected by the cooking methods you use for your food. While sprouted grains have higher bioavailability than unsprouted, whole grains should be consumed if possible.
• Bioavailability is affected by a variety of physical factors, from the rigid cell walls of plant cells to your own unique physiology. In addition to the rigid cell walls, your body’s pH level, and any acute or chronic illnesses can all affect the absorption of certain nutrients.
• Some foods inhibit the absorption of certain nutrients, while others boost the bioavailability of other vitamins and minerals in the body. Foods that inhibit bioavailability may include antacids, grapefruit, and brassica vegetables.

How food affects nutrient absorption is important for supplement producers and users. Ideally, your supplements should contain the nutrients that are readily available in the body.

Factors That Affect Drug Bioavailability and Drug Absorption

Several factors can influence bioavailability, from the formulation to the delivery method. When working in drug development or clinical trials, understanding the importance bioavailbility plays a major role.

If the supplement is delivered in a tablet form, it will disintegrate in the stomach and release its active ingredient at the optimum rate. A liquid supplement, on the other hand, is absorbed more quickly.

Also, certain foods may decrease the bioavailability of supplements. Some foods interact with other compounds in supplements, reducing their bioavailability. The quality of a formulation can also affect its bioavailability.

While there is no global consensus regarding what defines bioavailability, many people use a broad definition that can reduce the usefulness of DRI (Dietary Reference Intake) estimates.

Standardized Dosages

As an added bonus, the ADA recommends standardized dosages for essential nutrients. Depending on the dosage forms, like tablets, capsules, solutions, and more, supplement or drug absorption can vary. The ADA Guidelines recommend a range of dietary supplements that contain essential nutrients. These include vitamin A and E, selenium, zinc, and Vitamin D.

A good bioavailability report will highlight the factors that affect the nutrient’s bioavailability. The information will be useful when estimating requirements and establishing upper limits.

However, bioavailability can also be affected by several other factors, including the formulation, the type of the product, the manufacturer, and the dosage.

Systemic Circulation Plays a Big Role

With more companies scrutinizing the supplement industry, brands must be careful to avoid misleading consumers by making bioavailability claims.

Once a supplement, drug, or nutrients from food is ingested, the rate at which it enters systemic circulation can impact its bioavailability. Some supplement companies will use words to be misleading in their branding or avoid the topic altogether.

The National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureau handled the Nature Made case last spring and is increasingly looking at the bioavailability of their products. This is particularly true of products that claim to have a high bioavailability rate, but this does not necessarily translate to better health.

Bioavailability Translates to How Effective A Supplement Is

Moreover, bioavailability is a vital factor in determining the effectiveness of nutritional supplements. When it comes to absorbing nutrients, a high bioavailability level is preferred over low bioavailability. The faster nutrients gets into the systemic circulation, the more effective it is.

Vitamins and minerals have varying levels of bioavailability. Calcium, for example, has a standard bioavailability of 25 to 35 percent. Considering the bioavailability of vitamins and minerals, they are important for your diet and your overall health.

Expensive Pee or The Real Deal?

Many people have heard that when we take high levels of supplements that it is a “waste” and that we just excrete the extras. This is where the expression that “vitamins are good for nothing but making expensive pee” comes from.

While this may be true to an extent, the amount of vitamins we excrete can be mitigated. By understanding more about the supplements themselves and how they interact with one another and the body, we can create more effective supplements with higher drug absorption.

Understanding What Can Inhibit Bioavailability

While the nutritional value of many vitamins and minerals in your supplements is important, you must know the specific foods that may interfere with the bioavailability of those nutrients.

In contrast, an I.V. dose is injected directly into the systemic circulation, the bioavailability of an I.V. dose is by definition 100 percent. We measure bioavailability with a method called absolute bioavailability.

Foods that contain nutrients are less bioavailable than those in supplements because they are absorbed through the digestive system.

However, you should avoid foods that inhibit bioavailability and may not be as effective as they promise. This is similar to drug-drug interactions. It is important to know how the supplements you are taking can interact with what you eat and how it affects them.

The Cost of Enhancing Bioavailability

Bioavailability is a critical metric of a nutrient’s effectiveness. Not all nutrients are absorbed equally or are absorbed properly. For example, some nutrients compete with other substances for absorption, while others may block absorption completely.

Because of this, it’s important to know what kind of bioavailability a supplement has before purchasing it. If the nutrient isn’t bioavailable, the supplement isn’t going to be very effective.

The bioavailability of a supplement depends on a number of factors, including your health and the number of other medications you may be taking.

If a product has ingredients that have low bioavailability, then you would need to ingest more of the product to get the advertised results. This is why some skincare or supplementation is more expensive and while other similar products may seem cheaper, they are either ineffective or end up costing a similar price because of how much you need to purchase for the desired results.

EternLFX is Mindful of Bioavailability

At Combilytics, we are very conscious of the importance of bioavailability in supplementation. We take special precautions before starting anybody on the regimen and make sure that everyone is tested so that the administered dose is tailored to their needs. This ensures that the supplements can be as effective as possible and that the client gets the desired results.

The administered dose can vary from person to person. EternLFX comes in oral dosage forms and we are sure to monitor the bioavailability differences from person to person. When monitoring the bioavailability differences in clients, we are checking to make sure there is nothing that would affect absorption and that the nutrient bioavailability is optimal for reducing senescent cells in their bodies.

Polyphenols and Bioavailability

Within the EternLFX supplement are polyphenols like Quercetin and Fisetin – both of which are notorious for having a low bioavailability. Since EternaLFX is taken by oral administration, we needed to come up with a solution to help with the “drug” absorption of these supplements.

How Does Combilytics Combat Low Bioavailability?

At Combilytics we understand that your body’s ability to absorb the nutrients of a supplement is just as important as the ingredients in the supplement. With the knowledge that Quercetin and Fisetin both naturally have low bioavailability, our experts understood we needed away to help the body get the proper amount and be able to use it for the desired results.

This is similar to the concept of turmeric. On its own, turmeric has a low bioavailability. However, when paired with black pepper and fat, its bioavailability nearly doubles and you are able to feel the benefits a lot faster than by taking it on its own.

EternLFX has 4 bioavailability enhancers and 1 digestive in its formulation. This allows the body to receive all of the benefits of the supplement when its in systemic circulation.

Talk to the Experts at Combilytics Today

If you are interested in lowering your biological age from the inside out, talk to our experts today. We work with you to create a regimen tailored to your physical needs to get you feeling younger and more energized at a cellular level.

For more information on EternLFX, email Info@combilytics.com.