Support Your Pancreas & Liver

Your pancreas supplies the major digestive enzymes that help with the breakdown of starches (carbohydrates), proteins, and fats, so that nutrients can be absorbed in your upper or small intestine. Pancreatic amylase is the major carbohydrate-digesting enzyme. Amylases break down starches to maltose and maltotriose, which are further hydrolyzed into glucose.

Although cellulose is indigestible by pancreatic and intestinal enzymes, the microflora within the large intestine may degrade it, and produce uncomfortable symptoms in the process.

The great majority of fat triglycerides are digested by pancreatic lipase secreted by the exocrine pancreas into the duodenum. Lipases break down triglycerides into monoglycerides and free fatty acids, which are efficiently absorbed in the upper small intestine.

Protein digestion is initiated in the stomach by pepsin and hydrochloric acid, which denature and break large proteins down to smaller polypeptides. In the small intestine, proteases break down these polypeptides into free amino acids, and di- and tripeptides, which are directly absorbed by the intestinal mucosa.