Is Taking Collagen Enough for Healthy Skin, Hair, Nails and Joints?


You wouldn’t choose a quick-fix for your car, so don’t settle for less for your health and beauty. Make these easy decisions now so the mistakes don’t catch up with you later!

In this post, we’ll cover:

  • Our philosophy when it comes to supporting your whole health
  • The difference between plain collagen and “hydrolyzed collagen peptides”
  • The difference between “collagen builders” and real collagen peptides

Getting to the Root Problem

When you take your car into the shop to repair a flat tire, you can hope that the flat is all that needs to be fixed. 

Now what if you learned that your flat was caused by too much wear on a single tire?  And then you learn that the brake for that wheel was creating resistance. And the brake was causing resistance because of a misaligned part.  And the part was misaligned because you drove your car too far without replacing the shocks that support the suspension. 

That’s one long line of issues and one expensive flat!

Now, would you just replace the flat tire and keep on driving? 

Hopefully you would be able to do your best to fix the root problem, and take care of each issue downstream from it.  That’s what we mean by an whole-systems approach.

Our Philosophy: Taking a Whole-Systems Approach

Fortunately, fixing how you care for your body is less expensive than fixing a flat, replacing a brake, adjusting your alignment, and repairing your suspension!

How can you optimize your energy levels if your joints are stiff and your bones hurt? 

How can you fight inflammation if your blood doesn’t carry nutrients to the places that need them most?

A superficial approach is having another cup of coffee for a short-term energy boost that leads to another crash, or taking a pain-killer to take the edge off instead of managing what sharpens that pain in the first place. 

A systems approach means that to address a problem, you have to look at the big picture. If you’re symptoms are all pieces of a puzzle, repressing those symptoms with a superficial approach is like removing the pieces of a puzzle that you can’t seem to find the place for. 

Topical approaches don’t solve the problem, and they have the potential to mask a real problem.

For your health, a systems approach means to nip the problem in the bud. Getting quality sleep, regularly exercising in a way that is meaningful to you, and filling your body with the right amounts of the right foods at the right times are the very best ways to actualize your real potential. 

Once you’ve got your body running smoothly, then you might start to see where your body is overworking or underperforming in certain areas, and this is when supplementing can be most effective.

So, is supplementing with collagen enough to get me results?

The short answer is “yes”. Collagen alone will get you the same benefits that research has shown - moisturized skin, stronger nails, and possibly even better bones and joints. But that’s just scratching the surface. 

To get your best health, you need more than collagen.  

You need an integrated systems approach.  The oxidation and inflammation that many of us are exposed to stands between us and our potential. Once you get your baseline of health up, targeted supplementation will do more than damage mitigation. 

When every system is working together, supplementing with a clean collagen like Resync’s collagen blend will have maximum impact.

Collagen vs. Collagen Peptides  

We include natural ingredients that support multiple systems at once, but even the type of collagen used in our formulation is specifically tailored for maximum benefit.

Both collagen and collagen peptides are made, as you might expect, from collagen-rich sources, mostly the connective tissue of cattle and pigs, and sometimes from fish as well. 

These are parts of the animal that humans had been eating for millenia, but look around and you’ll see that collagen is almost completely absent from modern diets.

Enter the latest evidence-based supplement trend: collagen.  

The history of collagen supplementation goes back hundreds of years at least - it started with gelatin as a health food supplement in the 1800s.  But compare the effectiveness of old-school “gelatin” supplements with the next generation of “hydrolyzed collagen peptides”, and you’d wonder why anybody would be eating the same old supplement that hasn’t changed in 200 years.

What’s the difference between gelatin and hydrolyzed collagen peptides?

The main difference between intact, or “undenatured”, collagen and collagen peptides is their size, and that makes a world of difference when it comes to how effective your supplement is.

Collagen molecules - like the collagen in gelatin - are larger. Our collagen peptides are collagen molecules that have been broken down with enzymes (not heat!) into smaller, water-soluble pieces. 

Collagen peptides are more “bioavailable” - meaning your body can work with them more easily because of their simple structure. Your body may have difficulty absorbing plain gelatin because it’s not as bioavailable as collagen peptides.  That’s also why you might get gut discomfort like pain or bloating with an not-hydrolyzed collagen source. 


Fast digestion, rapid absorption, and effective utilization of hydrolyzed peptides make it easier for your body to regenerate your connective tissue and health. Add in the antioxidant support and natural anti-inflammatories of our collagen blend, and you can see why our formulation is used by many top-level athletes. 

“Collagen Builders” vs. Real Collagen

Let’s back this up a bit and talk a bit about alternative ways to enhance collagen.  

“Collagen builders” are supplements that mimic the protein and mineral profile of real collagen, but are made from amino acids (small proteins) from plant sources. Many claim to be as good or better than real collagen, however the science to back that up is suspiciously missing. 

Some studies show that isolated amino acids like proline, arginine, and others can help build collagen, but when directly compared to each other, how can we know which form is best?  

In fact, the only evidence we have is a single study done with mice. Researchers compared collagen hydrolysate (collagen broken down into small proteins, about 2-3 amino acids which contain proline and other amino acids) to proline alone (a single amino acid that makes up 23% of collagen).  

When mice were given either of these formulas, the collagen hydrolysate and the proline both ended up distributed throughout the body except for one place.  Can you guess where?

The only place that the single amino acid proline did not get to and collagen hydrolysate did was in cartilage.  That means that when it comes to your joint health, natural collagen may be the superior choice.

Other studies show that collagen peptides are absorbed and transported to where they need to go intact - they are not broken down into individual amino acids. This means that the excessively processed plant-based collagen builders have to go through an extra step to be used effectively.  

The evidence suggests that mammals use collagen peptides better than individual amino acids.

We still can’t say for sure whether collagen builders can stack up to collagen hydrolysate, but there’s plenty of evidence to show that collagen can help with a variety of conditions. 

We’ll stick with what we know works until the research catches up. 

Now that you have fundamental knowledge on how to take your health and aging into your own hands, stay tuned and we’ll go deeper into why Resync Collagen Blend does something no other product to our knowledge out there does in

The Bottom Line

Our Resync Collagen Blend was formulated to sync different systems in your body and create the most positive impact possible on your energy and well-being.  

It has the potential to help every system from your bones to your joints and fascia, from your blood vessels to your brain, from your muscles to your immune system. Use Resync and take a step towards and integrated systems approach that will leave every part of you working, feeling, and looking your best.  

We want to hear from you! 

Comment below with your thoughts and questions and we’ll get back to you in future posts!

Want the practical details on how to eat to support your heart health, beauty, and mental energy levels? Subscribe to our feed and never miss our best content! We believe that if you have the right information, you’ll be empowered to make the best decision for yourself. That’s why we break down the complex science of nutrition and supplements into practical takeaways you can incorporate into your life today.

While some companies try to sell their stuff with clickbait and fake news, we make sure you have the research to backup what we say.  Want to learn more about a topic? Let us know by contacting us or getting in touch on social media!

Works Cited

Barbul, Adrian. "Proline Precursors To Sustain Mammalian Collagen Synthesis". The Journal Of Nutrition, vol 138, no. 10, 2008, pp. 2021S-2024S. Oxford University Press (OUP), doi:10.1093/jn/138.10.2021s.

Kawaguchi, Tomoaki et al. "Distribution Of Prolylhydroxyproline And Its Metabolites After Oral Administration In Rats". Biological And Pharmaceutical Bulletin, vol 35, no. 3, 2012, pp. 422-427. Pharmaceutical Society Of Japan, doi:10.1248/bpb.35.422.

König, Daniel et al. "Specific Collagen Peptides Improve Bone Mineral Density And Bone Markers In Postmenopausal Women—A Randomized Controlled Study". Nutrients, vol 10, no. 1, 2018, p. 97. MDPI AG, doi:10.3390/nu10010097. 

Oesser, Steffen et al. "Oral Administration Of 14C Labeled Gelatin Hydrolysate Leads To An Accumulation Of Radioactivity In Cartilage Of Mice (C57/BL)". The Journal Of Nutrition, vol 129, no. 10, 1999, pp. 1891-1895. Oxford University Press (OUP), doi:10.1093/jn/129.10.1891. 

Peptan. Whitepaper: Collagen Peptides for Skin Beauty and Hair Health. Rousselot B.V. 2019.

Shaw G, Lee-Barthel A, Ross ML, Wang B, Baar K. Vitamin C-enriched gelatin supplementation before intermittent activity augments collagen synthesis. Am J Clin Nutr 2017; 105(1): 136-143.

Leave a comment

Please note, comments must be approved before they are published