Curcumin: An Antioxidant Powerhouse

I want to tell you about an anti-inflammatory substance that many people will already be familiar with and the name of this substance is called curcumin. You might have heard of it as turmeric.

Curcumin is actually the ingredient that gives turmeric it’s bright, orangey, yellow color. It’s a powerful anti-inflammatory and it’s a great antioxidant. It also has been shown to have anti-cancer properties in a number of laboratory studies. In animal studies, it has been shown to improve symptoms of colitis, of arthritis, and also of traumatic brain injury.

In order to absorb curcumin through your digestive system, it needs to be activated in a special way so there’s a number of things that can be added to the curcumin to help your body to absorb it. Examples would include black pepper, which is called piperine, phosphatidylcholine, or we can make curcumin in nanoparticles that’s called theracurmin, or we can make curcumin water soluble, which is called polyvinylpyrrolidone.

If you have digestive symptoms like colitis, you could take plain turmeric, but you would need to eat two to three grams a day. For other inflammatory conditions, I recommend one of the enhanced absorption forms of curcumin at 200 to 600 milligrams per day. This will substantially reduce any inflammatory problem you might be having.