4 Nutrients That Nurture Your Hair

You can use four common nutrients to better nurture your hair. You may already know that balanced nutrition can help you maintain optimal health and wellness. The right mix of essential vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients allows the body to perform its countless everyday functions. However, you should also know that certain nutrients have proven especially critical for healthy hair.

Just as you would want to give your body the raw materials it needs to generate energy, produce essential hormones, and strengthen itself against diseases, you should think about giving your hair what it needs to thrive. The following four nutrients can make all the difference in this effort. All

4 of these nutrients are found in Phyllotex hair vitamins.

1. Vitamin D

Vitamin D plays many important roles in preserving your everyday health and wellness. This vitamin contributes to immune system strength, strong bones, and healthy skin. It also promotes cellular reproduction, including the processes that produce new hair follicles and enable hair follicles to function properly.

According to Healthline, studies have indicated that insufficient amounts of Vitamin D may lead to alopecia (baldness) among such other unwanted issues as heart disease, brittle bones, and osteoarthritis. Your body needs a minimum of 600 international units of this nutrient each day to help maintain healthy hair.

The human body can make its own Vitamin D with the aid of sunlight exposure. However, people confined to indoor environments or climates that receive little sunlight may require supplementation. You can get Vitamin D in various fortified foods, or you can purchase supplements separately.

2. Pantothenic Acid

While Vitamin D helps follicles create new hair shafts, pantothenic acid, also known as Vitamin B5, nurtures the hair shafts that spring up from the follicles. It can help to repair hairs damaged by the elements (or overenthusiastic blow-drying) while also promoting healthy adrenal function, a must for hair growth.

Severe pantothenic acid deficiency appears rare in developed countries since a proper diet can address most people’s critical needs. However, a slight deficiency can still cause health problems while also leaving you with thin, damaged hair strands and impaired hair growth.

Foods such as corn, eggs, lentils, chicken livers, salmon, avocado, sunflower seeds, and portobello mushrooms all offer dietary sources of pantothenic acid. Even so, you may have trouble working these foods into your diet in sufficient quantities to ensure optimal B5 intake. Supplementation can fill this nutritional gap.

3. Magnesium

The mineral known as magnesium works as an antagonist to another essential dietary mineral, calcium. These two substances balance each other’s effects on the body. Through its regulation of calcium, magnesium helps to keep your head of hair intact and healthy.

If you consume plenty of calcium but too little magnesium, the extra calcium can form deposits in the hair follicles, interfering with the growth of new hairs. Since your head and body regularly shed old hairs, the resulting shortfall can result in baldness. Magnesium can help prevent this problem from developing.

Magnesium also plays an important role in protein synthesis. By helping your body manufacture protein, this mineral provides hair follicles with the primary material that makes hair. It also triggers the production of melanin, without which your hair might go prematurely gray.

Adult males should receive a bare minimum of 400 milligrams of magnesium per day, with women requiring at least 310 milligrams. Common food sources include nuts, rice, leafy green vegetables, and beans. Even with these foods readily available, however, an estimated 80 percent of Americans get insufficient magnesium.

4. Zinc

In addition to magnesium, healthy hair calls for the presence of another mineral, a metal called zinc. Zinc supports a staggering number of physical functions, including many directly related to hair production and health. By contrast, a lack of this key mineral can promote hair loss.

Zinc aids in the production of both proteins and hormones necessary for hair creation and maintenance. It also serves as an antioxidant, removing destructive substances called free radicals before they can damage hair cells. Zinc even supports the production of sebum, the oil that keeps hair moisturized.

Take this mineral away, and hair suffers. Researchers have observed a direct relationship between zinc levels and hair loss. Studies of individuals suffering from baldness have shown that insufficient zinc seems to occur alongside the disorder, with lower levels associated with more severe hair loss.

Happily, the reverse also seems to hold true. Research on the effects of zinc supplementation indicates that boosting zinc levels can also boost hair growth in people who don’t normally get enough of this nutrient. (An estimated 25 percent of the world’s population could benefit from such a boost.)

The U.S. recommended daily allowance for zinc calls for at least 11 milligrams for men and eight milligrams for women. You can get zinc naturally from foods such as beans, nuts, mushrooms, chicken, beef, spinach, dairy products, and whole grains. However, vegetarians and certain other individuals may benefit from supplementation.

If you’re looking for an easy way to help meet your hair’s nutritional needs, consider adding Phyllotex to your online shopping list. Our nutraceutical product contains all four of the nutrients noted above, plus a special proprietary blend of other healthy ingredients. Contact us to learn more.