Enzymes known as proteolytic or fibrinolytic enzymes are designed to break down proteins, but not just the proteins in your food.
When you take enzymes with food, they stay in your intestinal tract to digest food.
However, when you take proteolytic enzymes between meals or when food isn’t in your stomach, they quickly enter your bloodstream, help clean up your blood and make their way to your tissues and organs.
These special enzymes go to work in a seek-and-destroy-type mission to help break down and clear out proteins that don’t belong there.
Fibrinolytic enzymes also help remove fibrin, a clotting material that your body makes that can restrict blood flow in your arteries and connective or muscle tissue.
Fibrin can affect your heart and muscle health, and the general well-being of your entire body.
So how can you tell if fibrin or rogue proteins may be getting in the way of your well-being?
They may be if...
- You have concerns about your blood pressure or heart health.
- You have blood flow issues anywhere in your body.
- You’re troubled by pain.
- You have a buildup of scar tissue from an injury or surgery.
- You feel tired and can’t seem to get enough rest to feel fully recharged.
- You’re deficient in certain minerals.
All of these are just a few of the signs that you might benefit from proteolytic or fibrinolytic enzymes.
Fibrin is involved in blood clotting and when you have too much your blood cells can clump together and lead to a blood clot.
With sticky blood, small blood clot deposits containing fibrin protein occur on the lining of blood vessels and can interfere with healthy blood flow.
HOW BIOFILMS ALLOW BACTERIA TO HIDE OUT IN YOUR BODY
Bacteria exist in colonies called biofilms. When bacteria stick to a surface, they create slimy substances out of polysaccharides or sugar molecules, DNA, minerals such as iron, calcium and magnesium that they steal from your body, as well as fibrin.
This is what’s known as a biofilm. Forming and participating in biofilms is natural for most bacteria – that’s just what they do. They can form anywhere there’s a surface and enough moisture.
While some biofilms may be beneficial, most aren’t desirable for your tissue and organ health.
Dental plaque that forms on your teeth each day is a biofilm. And so is the slime that forms on slow-moving ponds.
Your GI tract is an ideal location for bacteria and the formation and survival of their biofilms. There’s a lot of surface area and no shortage of moisture or nutrients.
If your intestinal lining is damaged (GMOs and glyphosate are just two things that can damage your gut lining) or have less-than-optimal gut health, this can create the perfect opportunity for bacteria to take hold and construct a biofilm.
A healthy immune system is your best way to help slow biofilm formation.
When your immune system detects one forming, it goes to work to help break it down.
Once biofilms take hold, proteolytic enzymes can give your body a helping hand in breaking them down.
There are several oral proteolytic enzymes available today that can help break down fibrin and biofilms.
These include pancreatic enzymes, bromelain, nattokinase, serrapeptase and lumbrokinase.
Extensively studied in China, lumbrokinase is a group of very strong and novel fibrinolytic enzymes sourced from earthworms.
Earthworms have been used in Traditional Chinese medicine in East Asia for thousands of years, but it’s only recently that earthworm fibrinolytic enzymes, or EFEs, from Lumbricus rubellus have become available.
Researchers have discovered that EFE from L. rubellus is not one, but a mix of six enzymes – all serine protease components with different fibrinolytic activities.
These EFEs, or lumbrokinase as it’s called, are effective at breaking apart fibrin and the fibrin protein that holds the biofilm matrix together. And because it breaks down fibrin protein, lumbrokinase can also potentially improve sticky blood which could otherwise enhance risk for blood clots.
NEARLY 30-TIMES STRONGER THAN NATTOKINASE, LUMBROKINASE PROMOTES BOTH THE BREAKDOWN AND BUILDUP OF FIBRIN
Of all the proteolytic, or protein digesting enzymes, only serrapeptase and nattokinase come close to resembling lumbrokinase in terms of fibrinolytic activity.
But you can’t begin to compare their strengths…
Lumbrokinase is:
- About 300-times stronger than serrapeptase, an enzyme extracted from silkworms.
- Nearly 30-times stronger than nattokinase, the notorious enzyme extracted from natto, or traditional Japanese fermented soybeans.