Standard Process Inc. Cholacol - Gallbladder Support Supplement - Fat Digestion Supplement for Digestive Health & Bile Support - Gluten-Free, Non-Dairy & Non-Soy - 90 Tablets

I am posting this review in several places, for each product mentioned in this review, in hopes that it will reach the people that may be able to benefit from what I have found has helped me.I decided to post what has been key for me in recovering my digestive health after 5 years of exposure to black mold in an office I was in, and 3 years of treatment to detox the toxins that were circulating through my system under Richie Shoemaker's 7 step protocol for the treatment of mold illness: Enzymes.First, I realized that I had to have Small Intestine Bacterial Overgrowth, SIBO. I have the symptoms. So I researched what to do about that and and found an nih study that showed that two herbal protocols are as effective if not more effective than the standard extremely expensive antibiotic protocol for the treatment of SIBO. I put myself on one of them, FC Cidal and Dysbiocide, 2 caps twice a day of each. Immediate improvement in my digestion.However, SIBO almost always comes back after the treatment, usually within 30 days. Why? Along the way of figuring out what to do about the SIBO, I started taking pancreatic enzymes. I had a test that showed I was low on pancreatic enzymes, even though I was taking them at the time. Why? Then I got a recommendation from my Health Coach, who uses a Life Biofeedback machine for energy balancing, that I should take Cholacol. Cholacol is gallbladder bile supplement. It is given to people who have had their gallbladder removed. So, Why? again, in that I have not had my gallbladder removed, but needed the supplement. More on that in a minute. It is not enough for me to just feel better, I have to know why. I will not rest until I figure out the answers.I found such improvement after starting the pancreatic enzymes and the Cholacol that I started taking Enzymedica Digest Spectrum. More improvement. So then I started researching enzymes in general. I found a book called Enzymes: Go with Your Gut by Karen DeFelice. In it she describes a protocol for taking 10 capsules per day of Enzymedica Extra Strength Enzyme Defense for 30 days to eliminate hidden viruses. I know that I have herpes simplex Type A, and would love to get rid of it, so I figured, What the heck, may as well give the protocol a try and see what happens. I started it two weeks ago. The stuff is awesome. Within 24 hours I was able to start eating things I had not been able to eat in literally years, am sleeping better, pain is almost non-existent. Also, two of my employees are out with a nasty virus, but although I also have the virus that has flattened both of them, I am not sick. I realized when I found out that they were sick that I have that virus, but for me I almost didn't realize that I had it because it has been so mild, just a runny nose for three days, and a slightly enlarged and tender lymph node under my jaw that cleared up in two days. They are both much younger than me (I am 65) and very sick. I'm not.So back to the puzzles of why SIBO comes back, and why I would need pancreatic enzyme supplements, and supplements of gallbladder bile when I haven't had my gallbladder out. This thought process took me several months this last year. I realized that the pancreas was not getting enzymes into my digestive tract and bile was not getting from the gallbladder to the digestive tract, so, therefore, it was likely that I had something blocking the flow of those products to the small intestine. I also figured out that the reason SIBO comes back is because the bile from the gallbladder controls the growth of bacteria in the small intestine, so without enough bile from the gallbladder, you can treat the SIBO, but it will come back because the bacteria will just grow back again because there isn't enough bile to control it. So finally I scoped out the connections between the liver, gallbladder, pancreas and small intestine, and discovered that stones are produced in the liver, then move to the gallbladder and the pancreas through the common ducts that connect those three organs, and the common duct that allows the pancreatic enzymes and bile from the gallbladder into the small intestine. I also had a dull ache, sometimes sharper, especially if I ate anything with sugar, carbohydrates (which convert to sugar) or fat, in the lower right quadrant of my back. Those are all symptoms, I found out, of gallstones. The allopathic response to gallstones is to yank out the gallbladder. Um, I don't think so. So I researched how to get rid of the stones that had to be blocking all those ducts through which the pancreatic enzymes and gallbladder bile should be flowing into the small intestine. I found Stone Free, and started taking that. That was also a huge help. Within 24 hours the ache in my gallbladder had eased substantially. Now I still have a very light pressure from my gallbladder, which I don't notice unless I think about it. Most people from middle age on will have stones in the gallbladder and that also block those common ducts that enable the bile and pancreatic enzymes to get to the small intestine. So most folks need to get cleaned out. Stone Free will do it.So for me, it has been the combo of several things.1. Several different types of Probiotics including Hyperbiotics Pro-15, Perfect Pass and Culturelle.2. Pancreatic enzymes and Cholacol.3. FC Cidal and Dysbiocide to eliminate the SIBO. I am in the middle of my third course of it, and both I and my Health Coach dowse that I should continue to stay on it for now, so that tells me that the blockages are still present preventing enough bile from the gallbladder getting into the small intestine, that and the still present light pressure from the gallbladder.4. Stone Free to eliminate the blockages for enzymes to get to the small intestine, supplementing with the pancreatic enzymes and Cholacol until I get everything flowing the way it should.5. Enzymedica Digest Spectrum 2 caps taken with each meal.6. Finally, the addition of the protocol of the Enzymedica Extra Strength Enzyme Defense, 5 caps twice a day on an empty stomach, for 30 days. Actually, I will probably stay on it for longer than that, but I will see what both my own dowsing and the Life Biofeedback machine have to say about that when I reach the end of the 30 days.that has finally allowed me to eat like a more or less normal human being. I still can't eat dairy products, but am otherwise eating pretty much what I want.Life is good. Hope that will be true for others that may read this post.All of the products and the book mentioned here are available from and have been purchased from Amazon.

Amazon and Proline, it is despicable that you offer this very well-known product without advising the customers that this is very old stock!Thinking I'd be getting fresh product, I ordered four bottles from this supplier via Amazon. (Mistake!) Soon thereafer, when I developed diahrrea, I worried that something was wrong with my health. I didn't know that my health was fine, but my bile stimulator supplement was letting me down. It took awhile to figure out.Fresh Cholacol is probably the best product on the market for those of us who no longer have gall bladders. This outdated product, however, is just a shadow of the fresh product. What Amazon had sent me had dark spots on the tablets, and it tasted horrible on my tongue. What helped to wake me up was a Dec. 2011 customer review here complaining that the product they'd received was outdated.To give myself a basis of comparison, I then acquired Cholacol from a distributor authorized by Standard Process. (FYI, Standard Process prefers to sell to medical practitioners. When I phoned them, they said that they definitely did NOT authorize Proline to sell their products on Amazon. Apparently, they have this practice to keep up their standards and performance.) My new tablets were free of the ugly dark spots which were on all Proline tablets. The taste of the new tablets was neutral, and didn't thus prompt gag reflexes. In response to my question, Standard Process advised that these outdated supplements wouldn't make me sick, but they also wouldn't perform in the ways I needed.At this point, I consider myself to have been ripped off by the purchase of four bottles of Cholacol from this distributor on Amazon. I came here simply to warn others. This purchase is a sorry exception to an otherwise good Amazon experience over a number of years.Potential future customers, please note that the Cholacol sold here is NOT the same as you'd get from a Standard Process authorized supplier. Cholacol is a terrific product. Do not confuse it with the outdated stuff dumped on unwitting customers here.UPDATE: 9.28.12After I posted the review above, Amazon temporarily halted sales of this product, which I considered to be good business practices. After awhile, a new provider was found, and since I had named the old provider (ProLine), I left my review the same. I did end up switching to a different Cholacol supplier, however.Now it's come to my attention that Proline, who supplied my products at the time of this review, is back on the job. I have to presume that they are satisfying Amazon's standards, as based on customer reviews made since I made mine. (If not, I'm sure that customers will notice digestion issues, and hence will write here about that!)Due to Amazon's due diligence, and due to Cholacol's over-all excellence, I changed my original one-star rating to a five-star rating. The new rating points to my good experience of the product when it's fresh.Here's a related update regarding Standard Process and their product distribution practices. As my review indicates, I'd spoken with Standard Process before publishing my comments. At that time, Standard Process thanked me for alerting them to a vendor they had not authorized (ProLine). Back then, they said their practice was to offer their products primarily through doctors (for the sake of customer education). Just recently, however, I interacted with an Amazon customer whom I had referred to Standard Process, to get her questions answered. She later indicated that she had contacted Standard Process, and moreover, that Standard Process had sold her Cholacol directly. My update is that it now appears their policies have changed since I wrote my review, and that they've expanded the range of their merchandise venues.