Important Things You Should Know about Hemp-derived CBD Oil
It’s no doubt that hemp-derived CBD has become quite popular in recent times.
The plant extract is known in scientific circles as cannabidiol and is derived from hemp. For a compound that has remained largely unpopular for a long time, CBD packs a whole lot of incredible benefits. The few who actually know about it would usually associate it with oil, think creams, tinctures, vapes, or some other oil-based products.
It’s a known fact that oil and water don’t mix. This kind of makes the situation with CBD a little tricky since most of the supplements and products we use are often not oil-based.
A lot of people don’t really know but there’s a limitation to the various ways by which the body can effectively take up and utilize CBD in its natural form. Tinctures, as well as the other common oil-based delivery methods, are not really supposed to be swallowed.
Much of this has to do with ‘bioavailability’
Bioavailability is the biochemical term used to describe how much of a particular substance the body gets to absorb. A particular bodily process, known as the first-pass metabolism is majorly responsible for this ineffective absorption of CBD in the stomach.
First-pass metabolism and CBD oil absorption
First pass metabolism induces the first pass effect, a physiological phenomenon in plant extract and drug delivery science that explains how heavily the concentration of a particular compound gets reduced before it enters into systemic circulation.
The phenomenon describes the reduction in the concentration of compounds such as CBD which ultimately decreases the bioavailability of such compounds. This is not restricted to CBD alone. The problem also extends to a large group of other drugs and compounds such as morphine, lidocaine, curcumin (extracted from turmeric), nitroglycerin, and many of the other extracts present in cannabis.
When swallowed in its natural oil state, it’s usually very hard and ineffective for CBD to pass through the hepatic portal vein system. The first-pass effect of the first-pass metabolism greatly affects the bioavailability of CBD when it’s swallowed in its natural form. However, there are a few creative biochemical techniques that can be used to get the better of this.
It’s quite great that CBD’s application on the skin, hitting a vape pen, or dropping tinctures under your tongue will help you get CBD directly into the body’s circulation. Bioavailability is also not negatively impacted since the first-pass effect, in this case, is nowhere near most of the other methods where the effect seems heavily pronounced.
But the problem still remains;
Swallowing CBD in its natural form impedes optimal absorption.
It may surprise you that this is truly the case considering the sheer volume of CBD drinks and capsules on the market. You’re wondering if perhaps you’ve been getting a lower dosage of the advertised dose all along. Answering that question will, however, largely depend on the particular formulation methods that have been used in processing the extract.
From what we’ve discussed so far, the first-pass effect heavily impedes the absorption and bioavailability of CBD oil when taken orally in its natural form. As sad and unfortunate as it may seem, most of the CBD oil capsules on the market are like that. They are poorly absorbed into the body. When you take the average 20mg capsule of CBD oil, only about 5mg actually gets absorbed into the body’s circulation.
But this should no longer be a problem.
Some scientists have found a way around overriding the first-pass effect. They’ve been able to invent a technique that has now been used in the production of many other types of drugs. This has proven very useful since a little under half of most new drug compounds are hydrophobic and are usually impacted by the first-pass effect and bioavailability in the same way as oral CBD.
Water-soluble CBD: optimal absorption and bioavailability
One ingenious way to override the first-pass effect is converting oil-soluble CBD into water-soluble CBD. The average adult human has about 50% to 60% of their body mass comprised of water so this makes absolute sense!
But how exactly is this done?
Here at Health and Wellness Botanicals, we use a technique that is known as Self-Emulsifying Drug Delivery System (SEDDS). This technique greatly enhances oral bioavailability of what is relatively a poorly water-soluble product.
CBD extract can be ordinarily seen as a big blob of oil which usually is too large to pass through the gut lining to subsequently enter the systemic circulation. In the process, it inevitably gets broken down by enzymes and is then passed through to the liver for further processing.
Converting the oil-based CBD to a water-soluble powder breaks down the blob into smaller and tiny micro-sized forms. In this way, they are easily encapsulated among various other non-toxic compounds or components that help them remain very stable in their water-soluble form. In the end, what you have is a full-spectrum, off-white, micro-encapsulated CBD hemp extract
This way, it becomes much easier to orally consume CBD oil and many other similar drugs or products without any compromise of bioavailability.