Laura Schoenfeld: With fractures or bone health, in general, the main things you’re going to want to focus on are, first of all, calcium. Not that I’m saying you need to supplement a ton of calcium or eat tons of dairy if you don’t really eat dairy, but calcium is important, so you want to make sure that the person is getting at least 600 milligrams in their diet every day. And if they’re not, either find some extra foods to add in that are high calcium or possibly supplement short term if they’re healing from a fracture. The fat-soluble vitamins are crucial, so making sure that that person is getting vitamins A, D, and K2 in high amounts. That can either be a more isolated supplemental form, or it can be cod liver oil and a K2 supplement. Either one of those would be fine. You just want to make sure that they’re getting vitamins D and K2, especially. Vitamin A is important, too, so don’t just skip the vitamin A. It just needs to be balanced with the D and K2.
Now, protein is another thing that’s super-important and especially collagen-type protein because bone actually is significantly protein rich. That’s why bone broth has so much collagen in it, because bones themselves have a lot of collagen. So to help heal appropriately, you could do bone broth, you could do collagen powder. Make sure they’re eating a higher-protein diet. Anytime anyone’s healing from an injury, like a burn or a fracture or anything that’s damaging their tissue, higher protein intake is going to help heal that faster.
Sometimes things like proteolytic enzymes can be helpful, maybe not for fractures so much, but a lot of times with injuries or surgeries, if you’re trying to heal from something, then there’s the potential for a lot of scar tissue, and proteolytic enzymes can help prevent scar tissue formation. That might not necessarily apply to fractures, but I’ve had some clients that went through some surgery situations, and we usually do the proteolytic enzymes in there, as well, to help with the risk of scar tissue formation.
You want to be careful about doing too much antiinflammatory stuff because there is a role for inflammation in healing from injury. So if they’re having some turmeric or they’re having some omega-3 fats or other things that are anti-inflammatory, that’s fine. Just don’t pump them full of anti-inflammatories.
Somebody is asking if magnesium is important, too. Yes. Magnesium is one of those that everyone should be at least supplementing a little bit with them. I guess not everyone, but most people would benefit. Magnesium is not special to bone healing, but it should be considered, as well, in the process.
Ultimately, the fat-soluble vitamins, the calcium intake, the protein intake, and possibly doing a little bit of anti-inflammatory without going overboard would be helpful for a fracture.