An organ that serves many purposes, your pancreas is both exocrine and endocrine. What does that mean? First exocrine: Every time you eat, your pancreas, along with your liver releases into the duodenum (the part of the intestine that comes out of the stomach) the enzymatic and chemical materials that digest your food. The components in your food of all kinds consist of huge molecular chains that need to be broken down into smaller molecules. Only small molecules of food goes through the membranes of the intestinal wall into the blood stream. Only when these small food components get into the blood stream can they be circulated as nutrients to the cells in the brain, the muscles, and wherever else they are needed. Obviously a healthy pancreas is needed for good digestion.
How about endocrine? Among other important materials the pancreas releases insulin into the blood stream. As you undoubtedly know, insulin is necessary to transport the sugar, glucose throughout the body and into the cells. Only insulin can give proper regulation of glucose in the body. Distribution and regulation of glucose provides for the energy that each cell needs to perform its tasks. We all know of the disability that lack of proper amounts of insulin gives to people who have diabetics.
So the pancreas manufactures necessary ingredients for:
DIGESTION and DISTRIBUTION OF GLUCOSE.
This manufacturing plant right there beside your stomach needs the essential vitamins and minerals to keep its production processes going. The cells of the pancreas must produce every day. What do they produce? Insulin is a protein. The digestive enzymes are proteins. Proteins are made up of amino acids, taken from your food. However, B vitamins and many minerals and other nutrients are necessary to assist in the assembly of proteins.
Between 1 and 2 quarts of pancreatic juice is released every day into your intestines. Most of this juice is water, of course. It contains a large amount of sodium bicarbonate to neutralize the stomach acids and stop the actions of the stomach enzymes. It also contains many enzymes, only a few of which we mention here:
ENZYMES MADE IN PANCREAS and ACTION OF THOSE ENZYMES
- Maltase, Sucrase, Lactase
Simplify the sugar compounds found in foods that must be broken down to get into the blood stream.
- Trypsin, Chymotypsin and Elastase
Digest proteins into their constituent amino acids which need to be distributed to the body cells where they will be reassembled into the human proteins that serve human needs.
- Lipase
Digests the complex fats that we eat into the fatty compounds needed to make cell walls and other vital molecules.
HOW DOES INSULIN HAPPEN?
Only 1% of the pancreas is the millions of “Isles of Langerhans," scattered throughout this vital organ. These tiny clusters of cells release several important hormones into the blood stream. The most important is insulin. Incidentally, in the 1950s insulin was the first of the proteins involved in regulating body functions to have its structure completely defined. That achievement won the Nobel Prize for English chemist, Fred Sanger.
To keep the insulin flowing, most people need to get adequate exercise, control of body weight, and control of diet. As a matter of fact, almost any couch potato, eating tons of potato chips and drinking gallons of sugary drinks can get diabetes if he or she is determined to. We say this in spite of the established information concerning diabetes being inherited.
For those who want to avoid debilitating diabetes, there is the Pancreas Blend from Healthy Herbal Nutrients which along with exercise and moderation will give a long-lived pancreas.
VITAMINS
As previously mentioned, B vitamins assist in the manufacture of proteins, the “action molecules" in the animal body. If there is a job to be done in your body, there is usually a protein, or more often, a host of proteins that are called upon to see that the job is performed just right.
ESSENTIAL MINERALS
Many of the elements that occur in the rocks and soil are incorporated to perform specialized functions in biological systems such as your very own body. Many of the minerals vital to the function of the pancreas are known and Healthy Herbal Nutrients has included them in the Pancreas Blend. Since no one knows all the functions of various mineral products, a Salt Blend containing 77 trace minerals is included to ensure the full value of every essential mineral is inherent in this product.
PROPRIETARY BLEND
- Saw Palmetto Berries
- Bovine Pancreas Substance
- Gentian Root
- Dandelion Root
- Gymnema Sylvestre
- Uva Ursi
- Hoshou-Wu
- Licorice Root
- Juniper berries
- Aloe Vera Extract 200
All these ingredients have been shown in both traditional medicine and in modern observation to assist in the proper function of the pancreas.
