I'm not really looking to taking anything specific (or anything at all, for that matter), but some people claim there's so many health benefits to taking different herbal supplements while other people say they're awful and unregulated and will ultimately kill you.
What's the truth? Has anyone here taken herbal supplements, to great detriment, advantage, or with absolutely no effect?
Posts: 1784 | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I take them with great benefit. But I don't necessarily want to get into a herbal supplement debate/defense here on the board. They have worked well for me, and for my family, and I will continue to use them.
posted
Studies that have been done on herbal supplements generally show them performing worse then placebos for the ailment they are supposed to effect... this most notably occurs in herbs for depression, heart problems, and other serious ailments. However, many people swear that their herbal supplements ease minor aches and pains and make them feel more chipper on a day to day basis.
I've seen nothing that indicates they are dangerous, so if you're looking at taking herbs for just general day to day stuff, go for it. If you've got a health problem, go see a doctor and skip the herbs.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Herbs are powerful medicine. As a matter of fact, most powerful medicines are made from herbs. Many people DO get sick if they take them haphazardly. Just be careful, and do not take any of the stronger stuff without letting your doctor know, or find a homeopathic or naturopathic doctor.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Most powerful medecines are made from herbs? Not the brute force method???
Oh my God! Big Pharma is doing it all wrong! I have to tell them, this could save my company millions! BILLIONS!
Posts: 3243 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
I took herbal supplements (feverfew) for my migraines several years ago (at my doctor's recommendation) and it made a big difference. I had been getting several migraines a week, but after using feverfew for a while, I was only getting 1-2 a month.
Posts: 5879 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
Find a reliable source of knowledge, and research interaction with each and every medication you take. Approved drugs don't necessarily list interactions with herbal supplements, and vice-versa. Also be sure to tell your doctor what you take.
And herbal supplements are very different than homoepathic remedies (the kind with 10X or 100C on the label). The former can definitely affect the body, either for good or bad. So they might help, and might cause harm, requiring research before taking.
True homeopathic remedies are unlikely to have a single atom of their "active ingrediant" in them, whether in pill or liquid form. So they're not dangerous unless they keep you from seeking treatment for a dangerous illness. But they don't help, either, except as a placebo.
Unfortunately, "homoepathic" is beginning to be used in an imprecise manner, and is starting to be used as a generic term for all "natural" medicines. So some people include herbal supplements as part of homeopathic remedies. Be sure to understand the context of how the word is being used when researching it.
The federal regulations regarding their uses, packaging, and advertising are a crime.
If you come up with a new food, you have to do massive testing to prove that the food does no harm.
If you come up with a new medicine, you have to do massive testing to prove that the medicine does the good you say it does.
If you come up with new way to package a natural herb, you just have to make sure no one has proven it causes harm.
If you come up with a new food, you have to list its ingredients, in order of the most abundant to the least abundant in your product. Hence the ingredient list on Ketchup will show Water or Sugar first, and many other things before it gets to the Tomato.
If you come up with a new medicine, you must list not only what ingredients are in it, but their exact proportions.
If you have new package for herbs--a Food Supplement is the legal term--you have to list nothing. If your Garlic Pill is 90% filler, 9% Peanut Oil and less than 1% Garlic, thats fine. you don't even have to be consistent from one pill to the next.
Can herbs be useful? I believe so. But since no one is under any need to prove it, other than whatever cheap write up they can think of, then no proof will be obtained, and a lot of junk will be set up next to the goodstuff. We can't tell the difference.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Some herbs are known to work, totally accepted in American medicine. Off the top of my head, I remember that most of the ones I learned had to do with osteoarthritis and cholesterol. Chondroitin Sulfate and Phytosterols are examples.
Willow bark, of course, is another example of a plant product that definitely has the effects that people say it has.
Of course, many herbs don't seem to work when studies have been done, or do harm. A lot of money in the US gets poured into research to look into plants and plant products.
What was said is true, herbal supplements ("dietary supplements" and such) don't have to prove anything. The worst ones will actually harm you. If you care a lot about it, then do some research before you take the supplement. If you don't mind some placebo effect, then let them put Gingko and St. John's Wort into your smoothie (both, if I recall correctly, don't do much good).
Posts: 1892 | Registered: Mar 2002
| IP: Logged |
quote: then let them put Gingko and St. John's Wort into your smoothie (both, if I recall correctly, don't do much good).
but St. John's Wort CAN have an adverse reaction with taken in conjunction with some blood pressure meds..... so again, it is a matter of checking it out and knowing.
posted
And Ginko has been anecdotally linked to liver failure. Without scientific testing on either the benefits or the risks, anecdotes have to be taken a little more seriously, even with the correlation/causation difference.
posted
My doctor told me to stop taking St. John's Wort as it basically rendered my birth control useless.
Posts: 1015 | Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I use mild herbs, mostly for minor aches and pains and to complement medical treatment.
For example, I used to have terrible mestrual cramps, but I drink red raspberry leaf tea and take a calcium/magnesium supplement, and I no longer have cramps.
I use echinachea and goldenseal to help fight off colds.
I also eat plenty of raw garlic, which is great for the immune system. When my daughter was a toddler and had a diaper rash that would NOt go away, even with prescription crean, we pureed garlic in olive oil and smeared it on her butt, and the rash cleared up in 24 hours.
Always do your research, of course!
Posts: 2711 | Registered: Mar 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
This month's Reader's Digest had a halfway-decent article about ten of the "buzz-name" herbs.
quote: I agree that KNOWLEDGE about what you are taking is most important...
Absolutely!
I totally agree with Dags's post above, and with Dan's, and Suneun's. Although it should be pointed out that there's a reason why it's generally recommended to take aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) rather than willow bark (salicylic acid). But hey, if you like ulcers and stomach upsets, don't let me stop you.
One last point, to anyone who is convinced that natural == healthy. Arsenic is natural. So is cyanide.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
It is interesting to hear how many people think herbal supplements are placebos. I wonder how all the Native American healers, and healers throughout time, feel about these statements of "quackery?"
Black cohosh will bring on menstruation, and is also used to induce birth. Many of our pharmaceutical medicines are derived from plants/nature, whether they are officially herbs or not.(tree bark, animals, etc.)
Capsaicin from chile peppers is used for a number of things.
What is scary is when people think they are all SAFE just because they are "natural." Digitalis, from the foxglove plant, is used in heart medicine. It is also a deadly poison.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Eh. It depends on the nature of the healing. "Praying to the spirits" to take care of a gunshot wound probably wouldn't work. And yes, I include Christian spirits in that group as well.
Does that automatically negate any and all herbal treatments? No. But there are enough quacks peddling herbal elixirs that a consumer should be aware and not just leap onto the band wagon because, as others have noted, "natural" does not equal "safe."
And by all means, apply the same standard to modern medicine. Drug companies are always honest and scrupulous in their release of new drugs and their reporting of drug tests.
And doctors never, ever get degrees from less-than-reputable colleges and hold themselves to the highest standard possible.
For those of you who didn't detect the <sarcasm> tag, my apologies.
posted
But there's some oversight of drugs and doctors. I would argue it's actually pretty good, considering that holding back a drug too long for testing and releasing it too soon could both cost (or save) lives. It's a hard position the FDA and drug companies are in.
As Dan pointed out, herbals (and homeopathic remedies, which are only placebos at best) are not subject to the same regulation. (There's an interesting story about the passing of that regulation, and the strange alliance between naturalist types and large corporations.) Quality control is low or non-existent. Labeling is inaccurate or misleading. The alternative of home-brewing isn't much better, since potency from plant to plant varies wildly.
Drugs are heavily tested. There is repeatable science both on the mechanism for the drug's action in the body and for the drug's efficacy and side effects.
With herbals, there's mostly speculation on how and why they work. If an herbal is harmless, then the placebo effect is absolutely valid. The ritual of brewing an herbal tea and drinking it can have measurable, beneficial effects on someone's physiology. If the herbal actually helps with the problem, even better.
Now, processing herbals to find the active ingredient and performing the required testing is possible. But until that's done, and FDA approval received, it is fallacious to place them on the same level of reliability as approved drugs.
posted
To match BtL's sarcasm... We all know that all useful drugs are merely patentable manipulations of effective herbs. [/sarcasm]
I don't really do herbals, or OTCs or anything for that matter except a multivitamin and maybe some extra C if my gums bleed. I think pill-popping to solve problems is kind of a bad philopsophy, whether it's prescription or unregulated or whatever. I view health has emanating from intrinsic attitudes and behaviors, not something anyone can sell to you. But I realize I'm very lucky/blessed.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Personally, I hate herbal supplements. This is probably because I was taking them in place of performance enhancing drugs, and was being monitored only by the team trainer (who told the whole team what and how much to take). These supplements did what they were supposed to do, but the side affects made me miserable, the most notable one being severe dehydration. I supposed herbal remedies could be useful if your using them to treat minor aches and pains, but I wouldn't recommend going on a steady diet of them.
Posts: 1094 | Registered: Mar 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
"The alternative of home-brewing isn't much better, since potency from plant to plant varies wildly."
This is so true. One example is ginseng. Ginseng is all over the market. The most potent ginseng grows wild in forests, and takes so much from the soil it is almost impossible to grow commercially. It might look like ginseng, but has much less potency, and is sold as if it has equal potency.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Elizabeth, blanket statements aren't particularly helpful. You have to accept that even though there are dozens of plants that have specific positive effects, there are dozens of plants that have no discernable effect. It may be off-putting when someone declares that Plant X has a placebo effect, but most times they're just trying to indicate that documented studies showed no difference in the two samples. This could be done by giving two similar groups a sugar pill or the plant extract and telling both groups they received the plant extract. If you give two groups sugar pills and tell one they got sugar pills and the other they got Medicine Y, you'll often see a placebo effect.
Many times, a Plant can't give you the results you might expect because a plant is composed of so many different chemicals. A specific chemical from the plant might have interesting results, but is counteracted by another chemical in the plant.
Posts: 1892 | Registered: Mar 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
"t is interesting to hear how many people think herbal supplements are placebos. I wonder how all the Native American healers, and healers throughout time, feel about these statements of "quackery?""
Well, since most of them WERE quacks... I don't much care what they think.
Life expectancy and general health of native americans, and other shamanist cultures, weren't really very good compared to nations with modern medicine.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
St. John's Wort is a mild MAOI, which can be very dangerous when taking lots of medications, red wine, cheese, and probably other stuff.
I would check erowid before taking any herbal or dietary supplement, and if I was on any medication I would also check with a doctor and/or pharmacist. As others have noted, natural does not mean safe.
Posts: 1364 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Viagra approval was fastracked due to demand. What the heck kind of science is that?
Neurontin seems little better than an herbal because no one really knows how it works and it is prescribed for a wide range of ailments (even though the only on-label indication is epilepsy). Then there was the discovery that pharmaceutical sales reps were being allowed to consult (while wearing a white coat) with patients and encourage them to ask their doctor if neurontin might help their condition.
Any drug given to a child or pregnant woman can't be tested for safety on that population for obvious reasons. P.S. I know it's the best system we've got, even though it's not perfect, but it is profit driven. A drug being FDA approved or prescribed is no bettter assurance of its appropriateness than an herb being labeled "natural". Both need to be understood and researched.
posted
Actually, if it's prescribed on label it's very good assurance. Of course, as you pointed out, most drugs prescribed to children are off-label. And for some drugs, the most popular uses are off-label. Those are more problematic.
posted
I read an anecdotal case, I think it was in a book called "Should I medicate my child" where a child was on Prozac, Ritalin, and Neurontin and the physician was thinking about adding something else when the parents began to question whether he knew what he was doing.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
pooka, fast tracking is perfectly legit. Normally when applying for FDA approval you have to present all your findings in one large binder. Well, probably more than one binder, but all at one time.
When being fast tracked you can submit your sections one at a time as they're completed. This means you can submit your preclinical data before your multi year clinical tests are completed, for example. Before and after each submission there are meetings with the FDA to discuss revisions/additional testing that they feel is necessary and generally how the process is going.
It's more complicated for the people in the FDA and can be a logistical nightmare for the pharmaceutical company, but can shave years off development time. In the end, a lot of whether or not a drug gets approved (maybe most) has to do with the personality of whoever is in charge of the review of that particular drug. Not unlike which judge you get in court.
As for people not knowing how drugs work, you would be pretty surprised at how many drugs are out there that don't meet 2004 standards. But they *did* meet the standards at the time of approval. As of now there is no way to retroactively make a company go back and retest all its drugs to bring them up to speed. Largely because it's so impractical to do so. Let's say you've got 100 drugs on the market and have another 5 in the pipeline. The FDA makes some revisions to their standards and suddenly you have to find space for 100 more drugs to be tested? Keep in mind you're no longer selling any of them so your budget is tossed completely out of whack. It would ruin just about every company there is.
What the FDA does try to do is shoulder the load onto other companies that want to combine drugs. If Company A produces Drugitol and company B produces Pharmitol company C can combine them in the same pill and patent that. If Drugitol doesn't meet 2004 standards the FDA can (and often does) try and make company C bring it up to snuff. Company C will fight tooth and nail of course (it's not fair!) but it generally isn't too hard because over the decades there's likely to be scads of literature that you can use to support your drug application. Yes, you can use published results from peer review papers in lieu of your own testing.
As for lying about their uses and coercing patients into taking them. Yes, this happens all the time. And sometimes you get slapped with a few million in penalties. And who cares? You've probably made more than that in your shady dealings.
There's plenty of room for pressures/corruption in the FDA-Pharma coupling, this relationship isn't a beacon of light for the world to follow. But, well, just keep your facts straight.
Posts: 3243 | Registered: Apr 2002
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
