How to protect your liver
By Contributor
To keep your liver healthy you need to steer clear of potential toxins and eat a diet high in phospholipids. But what are phospholipids?
The secret to a healthy liver
When it comes to maintaining a healthy liver, you should be eating a diet high in essential phospholipids (EPLs).
As their name suggests, EPLs are essential for your cellular wellbeing. They are the building blocks of every cell in your body, forming many of the intricate structures inside cells and the protective membranes around them.
Cell membranes are extremely delicate structures, easily damaged by medicines, toxins and free radicals (oxidants). For cells to survive, damaged phospholipids need to be constantly replaced.
How essential phospholipids help the liver
Apart from their cell membrane repair- and protection properties, essential phospholipids have been shown to have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Their beneficial effects in relation to illnesses from coronary heart disease to cancer have been reported as far back as the early 1900s.
EPLs play a major role in your body's detoxification process, whether it involves chemicals or medicine. The organ subject to more membrane damage than any other is the liver, this can be related to low EPL levels.
Quite simply, your liver is your body's internal chemical power plant, converting nutrients into the food you eat into muscles, energy, hormones, clotting factors and immune factors. It stores certain vitamins, minerals (including iron) and sugars, regulates fat stores, and controls the production and excretion of cholesterol. The bile, produced by liver cells, helps you to digest your food and absorb important nutrients.
Orally administered medicines enter the body through the gastrointestinal tract and pass through the liver before entering your general circulation. This is called 'first pass metabolism'.
To keep your liver healthy you need to steer clear of potential toxins by avoiding the unnecessary medicine, excessive alcohol, and environmental pollutants. You also need to eat a healthy diet high in phospholipids.
What to eat for a healthy liver
The best diet is rich in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains and low in saturated fats. Although phospholipids are present in almost all foods, especially good sources are eggs, milk and other dairy products, and soybeans. However, the quantities are not well defined.
This is where a supplement can help. Essential Extreme contains a high concentration of 300 mg of essential phospholipids in each capsule. Taking two capsules three times a day accelerates liver cell membrane regeneration and stabilisation to help support liver function and keep you in top health.