What do tendon healing supplements actually do?

Question one, dose, run ingredient by ingredient

What do tendon healing supplements actually do is a question best answered by taking a typical tendon formula off the shelf and putting it through three questions, because a formula is a list of ingredients and each ingredient either passes or fails on dose, on timing and on the verb, and the three answers together are what the tub does. A typical tendon healing capsule lists hydrolysed collagen, sometimes with a token type II, vitamin C, glucosamine, MSM, turmeric or curcumin extract, bromelain, boswellia, zinc and manganese, in a two-capsule serving. Question one is dose: does the amount of each ingredient match the trial the ingredient is quoted for? Collagen first, since it is the reason the tub is in this aisle: the only tendon protocol with evidence used around fifteen grams of gelatin or hydrolysed collagen, and the one small tendon outcome trial used 2.5 grams a day of specific peptides for six months, while a two-capsule formula sharing its space with eight other ingredients carries perhaps 500mg to a gram of collagen, a fifteenth of the protocol and less than half the trial dose, so the collagen fails the dose question before the tub is opened, and any label that quotes the tendon research beside a sub-gram dose has quoted a study it cannot reproduce. Vitamin C passes, since the protocol used roughly 50mg and a formula carries that or more, though a reader eating fruit already has it. Glucosamine is present at or below its osteoarthritis dose, and has no tendon trial to match at any dose, so it has nothing to pass. MSM, bromelain and boswellia are present at doses borrowed from small joint or inflammation studies, none of which was in tendons, so they too have no trial to match. Turmeric or curcumin extract is present at a fraction of the knee osteoarthritis pain trial doses and has no tendon trial. Zinc and manganese are present at label doses that meet their reference values, which is the right dose for a maintenance sentence and irrelevant to a healing one. So on dose the formula's collagen fails, its vitamin C passes trivially, and its other six ingredients have no tendon trial at any dose, which is a way of failing that the label does not print.

Questions two and three, timing and the verb, and what the formula is left doing

Question two is timing, and the whole formula fails it together. The one collagen approach to tendons with mechanism and marker evidence is timed: around fifteen grams with roughly 50mg of vitamin C an hour before the loading session, so that the small peptides and the cofactor are in the blood as the load tells the fibroblasts where to build, the pre-loading protocol used beside rehabilitation. A daily formula taken with breakfast, or two capsules whenever the reader remembers, is not timed to anything, and its collagen, even if the dose were right, would peak and clear in a bloodstream that was not loading a tendon at the time, while the other ingredients have no timing evidence to fail because they have no tendon evidence at all. Question three is the verb, and it is the question the tub fails most plainly: healing is a medical word, and no food supplement may claim to heal, repair, treat or cure anything, so the words tendon healing on the label are unlawful for every ingredient in it, including the ones that hold sentences of their own. The register's sentences that a tendon formula may lawfully carry are small and specific: vitamin C contributes to normal collagen formation for the normal function of cartilage and bones, manganese contributes to the normal formation of connective tissue, copper, if present, to the maintenance of normal connective tissues, and zinc to normal protein synthesis, all maintenance verbs that describe what the body does with adequate nutrients and not what a formula does to a tendon, and collagen, glucosamine, MSM, turmeric, bromelain and boswellia hold no authorised sentence at all, so the honest version of the label would say four maintenance sentences about four nutrients and nothing about the tendon or the other five ingredients. What the formula is left doing, once the three questions are answered: it supplies a token collagen dose too small for the protocol or the trial and untimed to any loading, a vitamin C dose a reader eating fruit already has, four to six joint and inflammation ingredients with no tendon evidence at joint doses, two minerals that meet their maintenance sentences, and a verb the law forbids, while the tendon itself remodels under the progressive loading a physiotherapist sets over months, which is the only thing that heals it and the one thing not in the capsule. The honest tendon supplement, if a reader wants one, is the protocol's grams as gelatin or powder with vitamin C an hour before the session, or a capsule that states its dose as below the protocol and carries vitamin C's sentence as its only verb. The worked example is that capsule: two capsules, 1200mg hydrolysed type 1 marine collagen with 12mg vitamin C plus zinc, 120 for £16.99 at 28p a day, lab tested and UK made, the dose stated as below the fifteen-gram protocol, no timing claim, and vitamin C's collagen formation sentence as the only verb on it. What do tendon healing supplements actually do: fail the dose question on the ingredient that matters, fail the timing question on all of them, fail the verb question on the name, and leave the healing to the load.

What to check on the label