Herbal Medicine: Taken On Faith?

(WebMD)  About two-thirds of people taking herbal supplements to treat a health condition don't check scientific guidelines, say University of Iowa researchers.

"Physicians, pharmacists, and other health professionals should proactively educate consumers and advocate for public health policies that would disseminate evidence-based information regarding the appropriate use of herbs," says researcher Aditya Bardia, MD, in a University of Iowa news release.

Bardia and colleagues reviewed data from a 2002 national health survey of more than 30,000 U.S. adults.

In the survey, more than 3,300 adults said they had taken herbs to treat a specific health condition.

The researchers focused on 609 people who reported treating a specific health condition with any of 10 herbal supplements, including echinacea, ginseng, garlic, St. John's Wort, soy or kava kava.

Bardia's team checked to see if there was scientific evidence supporting the use of those herbal supplements for the participants' health conditions.

Overall, about 55% of the participants used herbal supplements backed by scientific evidence for their condition.

However, the percentage of participants using herbal supplements in accordance with scientific evidence ranged from 68% for echinacea to 3% for ginseng.

Apart from echinacea and ginseng, about one-third of the participants used herbal supplements based on scientific evidence, the study shows.

Part of the problem may be that many patients and doctors don't talk about herbal supplements. That should change, note Bardia and colleagues.

Their report appears in the May edition of the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings.
By Miranda Hitti
Reviewed by Louise Chang
© 2007 WebMD, Inc. All rights reserved

[dolljani]

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[dollijohn]

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Our psoriasis cure process is 100% Natural / herbal.
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[sy2502]

Plus has anyone ever heard of a placebo???? If you take the herbal supplements and you truely believe it will cure you it probably will(obviously it depends on what is ailing you but still that probably dosent even matter)
Posted by itwasntme000 at 09:35 AM : May 14, 2007

Exactly! The placebo effect is a well known phenomenon, but of course, if you think that tap water is doing you miracles, your doctors knows better than to tell you in your face that you are fooling yourself. Herbal cures have only anecdotal support (i.e.: my mom's friend's cousin took parsley and it cured his cancer, so it must work and there is a huge conspiracy of big pharma to make money at our expenses). Also one thing people don't understand is that herbs aren't all-round good for you, they can have side effects, and until both good and bad effects are verified in SCIENTIFIC studies, your doctor is not going to give you an opinion either way on them. Your quack doctor, on the other hand, will be more than happy to get rich at your expenses by prescribing you his quack medicine.

[itwasntme000]

Part of the problem may be that many patients and doctors don't talk about herbal supplements. That should change, note Bardia and colleagues.
from article

Umm since when are doctors trained in herbal suplements???? They are trained in chemical treatment of things and not herbs and nutrition as a cure for things.....
Plus has anyone ever heard of a placebo???? If you take the herbal supplements and you truely believe it will cure you it probably will(obviously it depends on what is ailing you but still that probably dosent even matter)

[drinuk]

This sounds like Big Pharma again attacking natural medicine which they cannot obtain a patent on. Even if they had done any serious and meaningful research into the stated herbs, which I doubt, they are not going to tell us that they work, Turkeys do not vote for Christmas, do they?

Had they have found hundreds of cancer suffers openly admitting that they were having success with bitter apricot kernals I would not have been surprised at that result, I would however have been amazed if they told us, which of course they never will.

You jusy cannot trust junk like this coming from Universities because they are in effect working for grants from Big Pharma.

[steelmanll]

Doctors need to be trained in the use of herbs and vitamins.

[hypnotoad72]

How about imported medicines - taken on faith?

Claritin and its generics say "made in India" on them. Some vitamins come from China. How safe are they? Should I buy a testing kit just for fun and games?

And if all these drugs are coming in from outside our borders, how come the cost to get medications is still so high?

[lupis5]

omg!! my mom ALWAYZ takes those herbical medicines......pharmisists and doctors NEED to explain to them all the scientific background......come on....i dont want ma mom to have any problems

[trader844]

I have been plagued with psrosis for many years due to diabetes. I went to a homeopathic D.O. and she cleared it up in 4 weeks using alpha lipotic acid pills,,, from the health food store. I have seen several doctors and skin specialists that gave me steroid cremes that did little to nothing. If you find someone who knows what they are doing,, using blood tests.. They will blow the medical docs out of the water.