Ever noticed how smooth and firm your skin was in your early teens? Well, that’s collagen at work. Even though your body creates its own collagen, collagen production starts to decline as early as in your 20’s. After 40 years, the human body can lose around 1% of collagen per year. Lifestyle factors can further accelerate its decline.
What Does Collagen Do?
Collagen has numerous structural properties but also plays a vital role in the repair of almost all the body’s tissues. Some diseases are directly linked to lacking this essential protein. Depending on which part of the body it is located, collagen serves different purposes.
In skin: Found in the inner layer, this connective tissue gives the skin its structure and strength and also functions in the replacement of dead skin cells. A lack of collagen in the skin can contribute to a decrease in skin health leading to stretch marks, dark spots, and infections as well as affecting the skin’s ability to maintain moisture.
In internal organs and blood vessels: In the lining of your organs like in the stomach, kidneys, blood vessels and spleen, collagen functions as a protective covering and a fibrous barrier. Specifically within these areas, collagen plays vital roles:
It helps heal the lining of your stomach and digestive tract and promote more healing.
The stomach has layers of tissues including several layers of connective tissue made of collagen, fibers, and fibroblast cells that produce more collagen and fibers. When the layers are damaged, ingested particles can pass through into the bloodstream causing “leaky gut.” When collagen is digested, it is attracted to these fibroblast cells and may help stimulate them to produce more collagen. Since collagen is the building block of this connective tissue, supplementing with collagen may help heal and even encourage fibroblasts to rebuild the damaged parts of the connective tissue in your stomach and digestive tract lining.
It aids in digestion.
The amino acids in the collagen increase production of hydrochloric acid (HCl) in the stomach. This has several positive implications.
- It can help prevent further damage. HCI breaks down proteins. Without sufficient hydrochloric acid, undigested proteins can cause allergic reactions which lead to the inflammatory immune system response that comes with leaky gut and further damage the lining of the stomach.
- It kills off pathogens. HCl kills many organisms that can come from tainted, rotten, or undercooked food.
- It helps your body to absorb minerals. HCl helps ionize minerals which make it easier for your body to absorb.
Also, collagen itself naturally binds to water so it helps move your food through the digestive system. This can help prevent heartburn.
In bones: Collagen helps reinforce the structure of bone minerals so a lack in collagen causes bones to become more porous thus weakening them.
In joints (cartilage, tendons, and ligaments):
Cartilage – This connective tissue found in the nose, ears, knees, larynx, joints, and trachea consists of collagen for flexibility, movement, and support. 67% of cartilage is made up of collagen.
Tendons – Collagen makes up more than 95% of the weight of tendons. In the tendons, collagen provides flexibility and strength in supporting the movement around bone joints.
Ligaments – Ligaments connect bones at joints and provide stability preventing hyperflexion or hyperextension. Ligaments are made up of over 80% collagen, so a deficiency in collagen in this area can lead to serious injury.
Problems with Collagen in the cartilage, tendon, and ligaments can also cause slower healing and even lead to injuries as well as allowing more friction between bones causing further damage.
In muscles: Muscles are comprised of cells interweaved by a connective tissue rich in collagen. Because of collagen’s vital role in muscle support and repair, a lack of collagen in this area can lead to a number of issues including muscle pains, a decrease in the muscle’s ability to work affecting metabolism, and even disease. In particular, fibromyalgia patients have shown deficiencies in collagen in muscles. Furthermore, evidence suggests that taking collagen hydrolysate may help decrease pain associated with the disease.