TAKING A CLOSER LOOK

Supplements, probiotics, protein drinks: Do they help, hurt, or do nothing?

Story: Theresa Campbell

Devoted to health and wellness, Dr. John Theeck discusses nutrition, supplements, probiotics, and more when his office, Legacy Clinic in The Villages, hosts a disease prevention seminar for the public on Monday nights.

“We try to encourage patients to get all of their nutrients from food, if you can,” he says, adding plant-based supplements can help you get the nutrients you may be lacking.

Plant-based supplements also are better, he says, over artificial or chemically made supplements, which can result in side effects.

“The ultimate goal is getting nutrients to the cells,” Dr. Theeck says, since the cellular level is the core of your body’s health. “You want your cells to absorb nutrients; most cells can’t absorb chemical-based supplements.”

He has met patients who take 20 supplements a day or hundreds of dollars’ worth of pills a month. However, Dr. Theeck touts probiotics, vitamin D3, digestive enzymes, fish oil, and a multi-green, vegetable-based supplement, Green Vibrance.

He warns certain foods can withdraw nutrients.

“Meat is filled with antibiotics, and antibiotics remove the good bacteria and the bad bacteria from your stomach,” Dr. Theeck says. “Eighty-six percent of your immune system is in your stomach, so antibiotics

LOOK GOOD FEEL GOOD give you an antibiotic, so what’s happening is we are wish we learned this a long time ago.’ They

“Our bodies don’t absorb certain proteins,” says Dr.