Joint Supplements - New Ingredients?

[joiedevie99]

I know that evidence in favor of absorption/utility of joint supplements is spotty at best. Nonetheless, I’m browsing some of the new options at Smartpak and wondering about some of the newer ingredients I’m seeing. All of mine are on Adequan already, so anything I add would be in addition to that.

Most of them contain the standard glucosamine/chondroitin/MSM. Then there are: ASU, Resveratrol, Cetyl M, Turmeric, Collagen, Silica, and Boron. Anyone have any opinions on these? One or more worth including?

Also, many include HA. However, my horse is getting 200 mg/day of HA in his Gut-X stomach supplement. This is the same, right? No reason to add more in a joint supplement as far as I can tell.

[Obsidian_Fire]

ASU, I think, has some science behind it. Turmeric is known to have anti-inflammatory properties - if you get enough of the active ingredient. I know Cosequin has a formula with ASU in it.
I have the same question about the HA in the Gut X formula.

@JB - I’m tagging you, what do you think?

[JB]

With 200mg HA in Gut-X, I wouldn’t spend more $ to add more. I don’t even know if there’s a point where more is potentially harmful. But too, it depends on the molecular weight as to whether it’s even useful.

I don’t put any real faith in turmeric. The research on its real-life usefulness is limited

I do seem to remember some decent research on resveratrol, but I don’t remember the amount that showed promise, much less whether any supplements contain anywhere near that amount.

The ASU component is one I did find decent research on as useful but again, I don’t remember amounts

You’d really have to go down the rabbit hole of looking at each ingredient via pubmed or JAVMA to see what’s there, in what amounts, and compare to the amounts in a product.

Green-lipped mussel is another newer one that DOES have great research behind it, but in amounts high enough to make it pretty expensive for horses And most products I found with it have significantly lower amounts than what’s been studied as effective. Unfortunately a lot of these “this is an effective dose” studies don’t have more studies to show how much less you can use and still have an effect. But I seem to recall in this GLM case that the amounts in products are so much smaller than the studied amounts as to likely be useless.

[joiedevie99]

Thanks! I’ll have to do some more reading. For now, I stuck one on SmartFlex Ultra which seems to cover the basics. Cosequin ASU interests me, as does the new SmartStride Ultra (resveratrol). Equithrive seems like they’ve at least done some research on their resveratrol product, but even their ‘complete’ formula doesn’t contain much of anything else.

[pony_baloney]

I’ve been using Actistatin on my 10 yr. old as a preventative. With all the talk about how much of a joint supplement is actually absorbed, this has some research behind their ingredient that increases absorption. It’s not overly expensive either. My horse doesn’t really have any issues yet. https://glcdirect.com/actistatin-equine-2-05-lb-928-4-g-equine-powder/

The only supplement where I noticed an improvement when using was Recovery EQ; my previous horse was a senior and it worked quite well. I think it had resveratrol.

[lorilu]

IIRC Cosequin is just about the only one with real research behind it. A friend was on the development team. She uses it for her horses and so do I. ASU was studied by COlorado State Univ and got good marks… I do not have a real link to that research. Resversatrol is an antioxidant and has lots of research behind it as well. I dont use it but have been considering it.

[scislandsprite]

Actiflex is the strongest joint supplement I’ve found dosage wise. However, I’ve had multiple vets say oral supplements don’t really get absorbed so they don’t do a whole lot. Unfortunately I agree, I’ve used almost every joint supplement I can find.