Who wants a healthy gut? We all do! If you want to make sure your gut is in good shape, probiotics can definitely help. Probiotics are important to healthy digestive system functioning and overall well-being. Probiotics are strains of bacteria that occur naturally in your digestive tract, specifically your small and large intestines. These bacteria help you break down the food you eat, “fight” off the bad bacteria that may find their way inside your gut, and influence the foods you crave.
There are many probiotic products to choose from but how do you know which one is best for you? Looking at all the different varieties of probiotics there are can be overwhelming, so Health Fitness Revolution has put a guide together to help you better understand the possibilities in your hands!
Diverse Microorganism Species
Lactobacillus, Bifidobacterium, and Saccharomyces are important to include for the effectiveness of the probiotic. Diversity in your natural flora is important in order to effectively utilize the nutrients in your food. A probiotic with all three will be better able to help create balance and the best benefits in your gut.
Stomach Acid Viability
Look for a BioShield capsule, which can keep the supplements from being broken down in the stomach causing the bacteria to be killed or for strains of bacteria that are able to survive in acidic environments. If your probiotic doesn’t protect the viability of the probiotic against stomach acid, then the stomach acid will kill off the microorganisms before they ever reach the intestines, rendering the probiotic useless.
Third-Party Testing
Look for a brand that has utilized third party testing and offers some sort of satisfaction guarantee. Brands that conduct their own testing may not be as neutral as they claim to be and may have some biases in their study design that makes their product seem better than it is.
High Colony Forming Units (CFU)
The higher the CFU, the better. If you can get one with billions that is best because the human body can be a difficult environment to thrive in so not all bacteria in the probiotic will survive. To ensure the best results a probiotic has to include a large number of CFU’s.
Prebiotics and Probiotics
Getting a supplement that is formulated with prebiotics and probiotics. The prebiotic components will work to help feed the bacteria and make them thrive. This helps the microorganisms in the probiotic to be able to make the gut their home and start producing health benefits.
Avoid fillers and GMO’s
Look out for fillers as they can be harmful to your health. It is also important to make sure there are no GMO’s for the most effective product, because GMO products may not be able to work as a natural product would.
Expiration date
Look for an expiration date on the probiotics. Some brands may have a probiotic formula, in which the microorganisms.
Viability Date
Make sure the species and strains included in the supplement are alive through the expiration date. Some probiotic brands contain bacterial strains that are not viable for long on a store shelf, so they may have a separate viability date, which explains how long the cultures are actually alive for. It is important that the strains are alive when ingested or they will not work.
Quality Control Testing
Check for quality control testing of the probiotic product checking for impurities and contaminants. A good product can cause horrible reactions or lose effectiveness if production standards are not kept. If a company continually checks its work, it will be significantly less likely to have a production error that could have severe consequences. Third-party testing is best, but any quality control will work.
