Why does Lacdigest seem to not work for us lacto-intolerant?

Doing a search for the term Lacdigest on the famous social network Facebook, there are results that report comments of all kinds but most seem to suggest that this product, widely available on the market, has few benefits for those suffering from lactose intolerance.

Why do people write such claims? Let's try to understand why.

From the commercial packaging of Lacdigest we can obtain the following data:

Active ingredient: BetaD-galactosidase from Aspergillus oryzae Amount of enzyme declared in "Units": 2'250, equivalent to 2'250 FCC ALU Enzyme quantity declared by weight: 22.5 mg Concentration: 100'000 ALU / g We sweat the active ingredient, as defined in our other article, beta-galactosidase is not the most specific enzyme for the digestion of lactose which turns out to be lactase. This entails a loss of efficacy of the active ingredient itself, which will break other molecular bonds that are not interesting to us.

Therefore, compared to some supplements that we can find on the market, Lacdigest does not have the best active ingredient ever but we can note that beta-galactosidase is the most commonly used enzyme for the digestion of lactose.

What can we say about the quantity?

I am lactose intolerant, fortunately not serious but I have my heavy diarrheal discharge after a precise hour and a half from the lactose containing meal if I do not take the supplements. Well, I had come to take 6 Lacdigest tablets to digest a pizza or ice cream, before discovering the alternative. At that quantity I have to report that it seems to work well and I can eat without major problems, but at what cost and at what commitment?

The personal result I arrived at seems to be shared by the people who published the above posts. The product actually works. But why so many tablets?

In fact, 2250 FCC ALU is a low quantity , less than the average of the quantity contained in the products we find on the market and almost half the value that the ministry indicates as “sufficient” to digest a dish containing lactose (4500). Taking 6 tablets is equivalent to equipping yourself with 13500 FCC ALU of enzyme. A value that seems to be recognized as valid by many users and by some recently trained manufacturers.

It is good to remember ( we explained it here ) that the ability to digest lactose is not the same for everyone , everyone has their own natural stores of lactase produced within the body and each has an organism that attacks with its own strength. the elements we ingest.

This means that we do not know a priori how much enzyme is present and what is introduced from the outside will be able to reach the small intestine, where the splitting and therefore the digestion of lactose takes place, and even the ministerial estimate should be taken with pliers.

That said, values above 12000 FCC ALU seem to work for the vast majority of users. The experience of us lacto-intolerants teaches us that to properly digest 5 g of ingested lactose you need at least 7-8000 FCC AL U.

A content of 5 g of lactose is found for example in the following products (we always report the values for a standard package, to facilitate understanding):

• 1 cheesburger
• 100g of ricotta
• 150g of emmental cheese
• 125g of Yogurt
• 200g of mozzarella

But here you will need almost double it immediately if we plan to eat the following foods (which do not have 5g of lactose but about 9g):

• 200g of panna cotta
• 250ml of milk chocolate

Let's get back to us, Italchimici Spa, Lacdigest manufacturer, knows the fact and rightly recommends increasing the dose in case of persistence of symptoms. The official dosage states: “ adults and children over three years of age: 1 chewable tablet for every 5 g of ingested lactose (corresponding to the quantity contained in approximately 100 ml of milk). If symptoms persist, the dosage can be increased. "

Lacdigest is therefore right, lactose can be digested with this supplement but, in most cases, we need to take several tablets . It remains to be seen when it is economically convenient to choose this product over others and if we feel comfortable taking multiple tablets instead of just one.

On the other hand, in favor of Lacdigest, we can limit the enzyme intake in case we are about to ingest a very minimal amount of lactose ... but who is sure of how our body will react? Don't mess with the toilet bowl!

So let's do an economic calculation:

Lacdigest costs on average € 12.5 in the 50 tablet format or € 0.25 per tablet.

If for a normal meal we need 6 tablets we have:

6 * 0.25 = 1.5 €

So with Lacdigest we go to spend € 1.5 per meal and take or chew 6 tablets.

Do this analysis with your favorite supplement, we prefer the innovative LACTOSOLUTION 15000 .

This supplement has 15000 FCC ALUs for each tablet, so for a meal we can take only one tablet and rest assured of the effectiveness of 7 Lacdigest tablets. Actually, the effectiveness is more than 7 times greater thanks to the active ingredient lactase which is more specific than betagalactosidase and thanks to the calcium content that helps the enzyme in its task.

LACTOSOLUTION 15000 is currently on sale € 14.99 and contains 15 tablets, or € 0.99 per tablet.

If, in this case, for a normal meal we need 1 tablet, we have:

1 * 0.99 = € 0.99

So with LACTOSOLUTION 15000 in basic package we go to spend € 0.99 per meal and ingest 1 tablet.

What if we bought the LACTOSOLUTION 15000 Refill pack ? The pack of 150 tablets is currently on sale for € 54.99. That is € 0.36 per tablet. So with the savings pack of LACTOSOLUTION 15000 we are going to spend only € 0.36 per meal and ingest 1 tablet! In conclusion, in addition to the greater convenience of being able to take just one tablet, we are going to save from 51 euro cents to 1.14 € for each meal by choosing LACTOSOLUTION .

Do we also want to evaluate the light-heartedness that an innovative and intelligent packaging gives us? Maybe in the next article .. follow our BLOG !