Seventy to 80 percent of the immune system is in the gut, and “when your immunity is housed in your gut, that is the forefront of everything,” says Dr. Davies. “The gut becomes very important to maintain and stay balanced so that we are able to withstand seeing viruses and bacteria and antibiotics and be able to hold strong.”
Dr. Davies’ research focuses on gut immunology, and she studies how the gut flora affects disease states, particularly inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn’s disease, and ulcerative colitis. She was inspired to create Lyvecap when her daughter was sick and had wiped out her gut flora, leading her to experience significant bloating, discomfort, and diarrhea. She had tried all the probiotics that were available at the time and nothing would work so she took things into her own hands.
“That was the start of it, but as I started progressing through my career of just practicing and seeing the rise of allergies and intolerances, I really started to understand, ‘Okay, wait a second here. That gut flora plays a significant role in our wellness.”
Dr. Davies noticed that the patients she was working with weren’t taking probiotics daily, but realized everyone always had a water bottle with them. “And so I thought ‘Okay, it would be great to just get a cap that you put on your water bottle and you just push and you go.’ And that’s how it all came together. It was really shifting the paradigm from treating disease to trying to keep you well.”
Lyvecap is helpful for anyone looking to improve their wellness but is a significant game-changer when it comes to athletic performance and recovery. Dr. Davies explains that athletes’ microflora and gut bacteria are different than non-athletes and it helps them to perform at an optimal level. When you look at an athlete with a healtyh gut, she says they’re able to, “decrease the lactic acid production and therefore there’s less soreness in recovery and they’re able to push faster and push harder on the next training session.”
There are numerous probiotic options on the market, but Dr. Yavies explains that your gut requires multiple strains of bacteria, “and it has to be the right crafted strains that come together that are able to do that.” Lyvecap offers a proprietary blend with eight strains of bacteria and 200 billion CFUs. “What we know is that it takes this amount of bacteria to actually make a difference within the gut…to try and populate and create a balance.”
This blend comes in both a cap form ($150 for a 30-day supply) that you place on top of the water bottle (it’s free with your purchase) and a sachet form ($150 for a 30-day supply) making it easy for you to consistently take your probiotics. You can mix them with anything except for hot or carbonated liquids, as these products live bacteria.
Though this isn’t the only probiotic offering available, Dr. Davies is changing the game and breaking through the noise of sports drinks marketed for recovery that don’t focus on the gut and gut bacteria, which really might be the key to everything.
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