I have Hashimoto's thyroiditis, so I am using this particular kind of curcumin because it contains no bioprene. Hashimoto's is an autoimmune disease which causes inflammation and attacks your thyroid and kills it, which causes hypothyroidism. Bioprene is black pepper extract, and black pepper is a nightshadeâ€"all nightshades should be avoided for people with autoimmune disease. If you want to increase absorption just take the pill with any kind of fat such as an avocado, coconut oil, etc. Just thought I'd mention that since 95% of hypothyroid patients have Hashimoto's and many don't know it because doctors won't bother to test for it. If you are hypothyroid, you probably have Hashimoto's. If you just learned something in that last paragraph, then I have more advice for your all-over aches and pains. That's inflammation caused by the disease. You're not just "getting older," you're not supposed to hurt everywhere. Once you have one autoimmune diseases, such as Hashimoto's, it can lead to more autoimmune diseases if you don't regulate your diet and get the inflammation under control. Fibromyalgia and Rheumatoid Arthritis are two autoimmune diseases which cause pain in your muscles and joints due to inflammation. Turmeric / Curcumin is not only great at controlling inflammation, but it also chelates excess iron stored in the body as ferritin. Sometimes, people with Hashimoto's have infections (which leads to excess ferritin stores) and this may actually be the root cause of their Hashimoto's. If you have high ferritin, this may suggest you have an infection somewhere that needs to be addressed. I did have an infection on a root canal and my blood tests revealed my ferritin was pretty high at 190-something. I had the root canal tooth pulled a few months ago and now I am taking this Curcumin to help chelate the excess ferritin out of my body and also help get my inflammation under control, since I have not been strictly on the AIP diet for several months (more about that later). High ferritin can cause hair loss, lower back pain, fatigue, etc. Google the symptoms of high ferritin if you are interested. Many of these symptoms are the same as Hashimoto's symptoms, in general, because Hashimoto's causes inflammation which leads to pain all over the body, fatigue, etc. If you have an autoimmune diseasee, you can help yourself a lot by going on the AIP diet (autoimmune protocol) for free. Basically, this means you have to give up alcohol, coffee, grains, beans, nuts, diary, nightshades and flowering spices as well as many supplements you might think are "helping" you but which are actually making you worse. For example, I was taking ashwaganda for stress, but as soon as I stopped taking it, it became obvious that it had only caused me more stress. In fact, when I began taking it, I only had mild stress, but by the time I had to see a doctor for anxiety, it was several years later and my anxiety was through the roof. I had been taking ashwaganda faithfully every day to "help" combat the stress not realizing it is actually a nightshade and only caused my immune system to attack my thyroid more, which caused my thyroid to dump hormones into my body which created a feeling of anxiety. It was a purely physical thing, not mentally-caused anxiety (although when your body is in fight or flight mode for any reason, it amplifies any worries you have so it can seem like a mental issue). Thank goodness I did not make the mistake of going on antidepressants. Many undiagnosed Hashimoto's patients get on antidepressants and it only makes them much worse in the long run because it's not a brain issue at all, so they're just unnecessarily messing up their brain chemistry to treat a thyroid issue caused by an immune disease. What's more troubling is the autoimmune disease never gets treated properly and so the problem just gets worse. Hashimoto's thyroiditis can actually lead to Hashimoto's encephalitis when the brain becomes inflamed. This is not goodâ€"it can kill you or completely incapacitate you from being able to hold down a job or live a normal lifeâ€"and no amount of antidepressant is going to fix it because it has absolutely nothing to do with the mechanisms of antidepressants. It's an inflamed brain that needs to be treated right away. Unfortunately, this form of curcumin can't really help with brain inflammation, I don't think, but there is a special kind of curcumin that has been created to pass the blood-brain barrier. NOW also sells a version of that. If anyone here thinks they might have Hashimoto's based on what I've said here, I would definitely recommend you join the Hashimoto's 411 group on Facebook (it's free) and learn how to go about the AIP diet properly, also for free. They have helped thousands of people get their lives back. Basically, you just need to learn what to eat and what supplements NOT to take. It is mostly about NOT taking things that will cause an immune response that will hurt you. A lot of stuff in "thyroid support" formulas such as ashwaganda, selenium and iodine cause inflammation and worsen symptoms. So, you sit there popping pills thinking you're doing the right thing, but you're doing the exact opposite. The Hashimoto's 411 group is a patient-only resource where people share the knowledge they have gained with each otherâ€"there are no doctors allowed to try to sell their miracle cures. To give you an example of how well autoimmune protocol works, when I first went to the doctor 2 years ago, I was about to jump out a window because my anxiety was out of control. My skin had various rashes, dry yellow patches that cracked and bled, my mind was a mess with brain fog, I had red spots on my feet and ankles, a mysterious scab about 2 inches in circumfrence on my left ankle that looked disgusting, night sweats, heart palpitations, pain everywhere in my body, pale yellow greasy skin, my hair was suddenly getting much thinner, I had chronic fatigue, serious depression, and I kept gaining weight to the point that I was 35 lbs overweight. My doctor diagnosed me with Hashimoto's based on a blood test and told me to take a Levothyroxine pill. That's all he said. I went online and Googled "Hashimoto's" and found the facebook group I mentioned and began reading day and night to see what I could do to cure myself. Apparently, there is no cure, but I went on the AIP diet right away and stopped all my supplements. Within days, I started to feel better. By the end of the week, I felt much better, and by the end of the month MOST of my symptoms were gone. This was not results from Levothyroxine, this was results from the AIP diet. I know this because I have not been staying on the AIP diet for the past several months, since I felt so good I basically thought I was cured. Well, now I have some aches and pains again and I don't enjoy that, so now I am back at it again strictly and I am using this supplement to help speed up recovery again. I know a different kind of curcumin worked pretty well in the past, so I think this will work fine. I've only taken 3 pills so far since yesterday and I'm feeling better already