October 8, 2025 • 55 mins
In this episode, we are going to be donning our high pressure suit and diving into another single Chinese herb: gǎo běn, Ligustici Rhizoma or Chinese lovage root. This herb is in the Chinese medical sub-category of warm, acrid herbs that release the exterior. In addition to helping treat external attacks or colds, it can be helpful in treating pain and wind-dampness. As usual, we will explore all the intricacies of this herb as well as an explanation of its category. And as always, we will look at something a little different…we are going to look at the microbiome and pre- and post- biotics. Each episode of the podcast will go into great depth about a single herb or formula. Besides covering the basics of herbology including category, and functions, we will explore the history, quality, science, pharmacology, evidence, and any potential interactions of each herb or formula. Please join us in this exciting episode exploring gǎo běn, Ligustici Rhizoma or Chinese lovage root!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
That Angelica, Hi, and welcome to Sperbs Herbs Episode ninety five.
We're gonna be talking about Gao ben today, or the
gousta chie raisoma or Chinese lovage root. As always, I'm
your presenter, doctor Greg Sperbert for the ADO. Let's get
(00:25):
into it. Today, we're gonna be dotting our high pressure
suit and diving into another single Chinese herb, gal Ben,
the gousta chi raizoma or Chinese lovage root. This herb
is in the Chinese medical subcategory of warm acrid herbs
that release the exterior. In addition to helping treat external
(00:45):
attacks or colds, it can be helpful in treating pain
and win dampness. And as usual, we explore all the
intricacies of this herb as well as an explanation of
its category. And as always we will be looking we
will look at something a little different. We're going to
look at the microbiome and pre impost biotics. Interesting. This
(01:05):
is a hot topic right now, join us for another
interesting episode. Before we get into that, I just want
to let you know we are having we are starting
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(02:36):
So for a little something different today, we're going to
talk about the microbiome. I just did. I just presented
a course in my integrative nutrition series looking at pre
impost biotics and digestions, and thought that would make a
great little something different. This is such a hot, hot
topic right now. In fact, as soon as I was
done teaching the course, there were some interesting papers that
came out. Was amazing. So always there's a lot on
(03:01):
this right now because we're learning so much about it.
So any discussion pre or probiotics is predicated on the
concept of the microbiome. The International Scientific Association of Probiotics
and Prebiotics describe the microbiome. Different areas of the human
body digestive track or gut, skin, vaginal track, oral cavity,
(03:24):
and others are home to different communities of microorganisms called microbiotas.
The word microbiome generally refers to the microorganisms in a
defined environment, for example, the human colon, along with the
environment itself. So the microbiota is the organisms living in
(03:45):
a particular environment. All of it together is a microbiome. Well,
microbiome and microbiota are sometimes used interchangeably. Microbiota properly refers
to the microorganisms themselves themselves, bacteria, arkaa, arka, lower and
higher eukaryots, and viruses in a defined environment. Now, if
(04:08):
you're not familiar with this term arka eight arka. I've
seen it written many times, I haven't really heard it
pronounced arka. This is relatively new, only discovered in the
last ten twenty years, and is a whole nother kingdom
of animals. You know how we have plants, and we
have animals and viruses maybe their own kingdom. We have
(04:32):
this arcadia that we just discovered. Really fascinating. And when
I first did this, like just a few weeks ago,
I said, I don't think I've heard of arkaa being
in the microbiome, so I don't know if they're just
talking about arka in general or specifically the microbiome. And
then like just two or three days after I gave
that lecture, I was reading an article on it, and
sure enough they mentioned arka being part of the microbiomes.
(04:54):
So it is part of the microbiome. So very interesting
there and fascinating, way more than we can get into
right here. If you want to learn, I mean This
is stuff when I was going through school didn't exist
at all, so very fascinating, so if you want to
learn more about it, urka. All of these microorganisms comprise
the microbiota. Even though many microbiome studies only focus on
(05:17):
the bacterial components, is now clear that the human microbiota
plays important roles in health and disease. They continue. The
gut microbiota is the most studied microbiotics associated with the
human body, with the digestive track containing the highest density
(05:37):
of human associated microorganisms. Bacteria in the gut harvest energy
from food, produce bioactive substances such as neurotransmitters, enzymes, short
chain fatty acids, and vitamins, play an important role in
programming the immune system and may participate in metabolic functions.
(05:58):
To date, researchers have been un able to define a
healthy gut micro biota because the community of gut microbes
varies greatly among healthy people. Differences in gut microbiota composition
compared to health controls have been demonstrated in people with
various diseases or conditions, but in most cases, microbiotic differences
(06:20):
have not been shown to cause any disease. In other words,
if you have a disease, your microbiota is off, But
just because your microbioda is off doesn't mean it's causing
the disease. It might eight we're still investigating them, but
there's no evidence of that at this point. Diet and
medications are important factors that account for gut microbiotic variability
(06:43):
in large cohort studies. Antibiotics are a particularly powerful way
to alter the gut microbiota. When someone is on antibiotics,
the microbial community is altered drastically throughout the course of
the medication, but microbes typically return to the baseline levels
or close to baseline levels after the treatment ends. In
(07:04):
other words, may not be a long term issue at all.
Dietary changes may also modulate the gut microbiota. Probiotics, probiotics,
fermnted foods, and fiber are dietary means of influencing the
gut microbiota composition or metabolic activities. Indeed, probiotics in particular
(07:28):
must by definition, have a mechanism of action that involves
their selective utilization by gut micro organisms. In other words,
it's got to be used, it's got to do something.
I think this is a great introduction into the gut microbiome,
which is what we're concentrating on today. Particularly like something
that says researchers have been unable to define a healthy
(07:51):
gut microbiota because the community of gut microbes varies greatly
among healthy people. This is probably a function the current
state of research, and hopefully we will learn more about
what is a healthy biome versus an unhealthy one and
how we can intervene to help make and sustain a
healthy biome. But we are not there yet, and that
(08:15):
is where a lot of the issues come from. With
the biotics we are going to discuss to a certain extent,
this is my main issue. It's like, I think we've
established that the microbiome is incredibly important for our health,
that it affects a lot of things about us. We
found out it can play a role in depression, anxiety,
in our immune system, as well as just our ability
(08:38):
to bring in nutrients and things along those lines. It
is absolutely very important. We've established that pretty well at
this point. What we haven't established is what is a
healthy microbiome? How do we change an unhealthy microbiome into
a healthy one? And you know, those are the two
major factors here, and we don't know how to do
(09:00):
these yet. And yet there's a lot of supplements out
there that say, hey, you need to be taking us
in order to have a healthy microbiome, which is not true.
It is not established. They've done studies, yes, and all
the studies which I get into with this course, I
get into this studies quite a bit. This Ingram nutrition
course that I developed, We're not gonna do that today.
(09:21):
But when we look at the studies that are talking about,
you know, this particular strain of probiotics or probiotics is
very helpful for this. Almost all of them are small
and are paid for by the manufacturers of those products.
And something that I haven't seen, which we really desperately need,
is a comparison. Instead of saying strain XYZ does all
(09:46):
these great things, what we need to do is say
strain ABC versus strained DEF versus strain x y Z
versus strain q QBC, whatever it is, all these strains together,
this is the best one. This is the one that
as the most for micro We don't have studies that
I've seen that do any of that, and so I
really feel like we're living in the wild West. When
(10:08):
it comes to the microbiome, we don't know what works
what doesn't work. We do know there's probably some positive
things with using it. I'm not anti probiotic. I'm just
very skeptical about what people are saying about individual products. Okay,
so that's our introduction. Let's continue with prebiotics. What are
(10:29):
we mentioned probiotics. We mentioned probiotics. What are they? So?
The Male Clinic says probiotics are foods, typically high fiber foods,
that acts as food for human microflora. Prebiotics are used
with the intention of improving the balance of these micro organisms.
Health Wine similarly says probiotics are high fiber foods that
(10:53):
serve as food for probiotics, allowing them to function properly
and effectively. Examples of prebiotic foods are fruits, vegetables, and
whole grains. Sounds like a healthy diet to begin with
our Koeak and sleez Zuez. Sleez Zeuska gives a more
(11:13):
scientific overview. In nineteen ninety five, probiotics were defined by
Gibson and on Roberfreud as non digested food components that
through the stimulation of growth and or activity of a
single type or limited amount of microorganisms residing in the
gastroom intestinal tract improve the health condition of a host.
(11:34):
In two thousand and seven FAO, which I can't remember
what that sends for the WHO and WHO World Health
Organization experts described probiotics as a non viable food component
that confers a health benefit on the host associated with
modulation of the microbiota. Probiotics may be used as an
alternative to probiotics or as an additional support for them. However,
(11:58):
different probioducts will still emulate the growth of different indigenous
gut bacteria. Prebiotics have enormous potential for modifying the gut microbiota,
but these modifications occur at the level of individual strains
in species and are not easily predicted a priority in
other words, ahead of time. There are many reports on
(12:21):
the beneficial effects of prebiotics on human health, and I
agree with that those studies are pretty positive with it,
but again we don't know which ones do exactly what.
The International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Probiotics we talked
about this earlier ice APP says the current scientific definition
of a prebiotic was developed by a panel of experts
in microbiology, nutrition, and clinical research convened by ice APP
(12:44):
in twenty sixteen. This current consensus definition is quote a
substrate that is selectively utilized by host microorganisms, conferring a
health benefit. Thus, the concepts three essential parts a substance,
a physiological beneficial effect, and a microbiotic mediated mechanism. Prebiotics
(13:08):
are frequently equated with dietary fibers, but only a subset
of dietary fibers actually qualify as prebiotics, and indeed prebiotics
may derive from non fiber substances such as polyphenols. According
to the scientific consensus definition, a prebiotic compound must confer
(13:28):
a beneficial physiological effect on the host, and that effect
should derive at least in part from utilization of the
compound by resident microbes. However, to qualify under this definition,
the prebiotic substance must affect a limited group of microorganisms
in the host rather than the entire microbial ecosystem, thereby
(13:52):
meeting the criterion of being selectively utilized. Prebiotics may be
present naturally or insynthesized forms. The majority of research into
their health effects has focused on isolated substances to allow
for tire control of substance in DOST and less on
(14:15):
probiotics as part of whole plant foods. Okay, whole plant foods.
That sounds a lot like herbs there, so you know
herbs can play a role in prebiotics. Get into that.
Maybe not so much here, but in the big when
I did my whole course. Probiotics have been studied for
certain health effects such as reduction of infections, cardio metabolic health,
(14:37):
mineral availability, and immune modulation. The most commonly studied probiotics
are the soluble fibers inuline fructo oligo sacharides or foss
galacto oligo sacrides are Geos's and more recently human milk
oligosaccharides HMOs so glactago. The gos glactogo psacharides are also
(15:02):
They're not human milk, but they are milk oligosaccharides well.
The probiotic substances with the most well documented health effects
to date are fermentable carbohydrates in the gut. The consensus
definition allows for a broad range of substances targeting different
host niches, such as the mouth, skin, or eurogenital tract
to be considered prebiotics given appropriate scientific support. And that's
(15:29):
an overview of probiotics. Let's talk about probiotics. So again,
that same organization, the International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Probiotics,
also has a great introduction to probiotics. Quote. The term
probiotic was defined in two thousand and one by an
expert consultation of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the
United Nations and the World Health Organizations that's FAO and WHO.
(15:53):
In twenty thirteen, ice APP convened in expert panel to
review the term probiotic in literature surrounding it. The net
result was a publication reiterating the definition with minor grammatical changes.
Live quote live microorganisms that, when administered in adequate amounts,
confer a health benefit on the host. So live microorganisms
(16:18):
are important. We're not going to talk about post biotics here,
but that is what separates probiotics from post biotics. Post
biotics or when there are no live micro organisms and
yet a lot of the same substances are still there.
I continues, this is widely accepted. This is the widely
accepted scientific definition of probotics around the world. Live microorganisms
(16:41):
may be present in many foods and supplements, but only
characterized strains with a scientifically demonstrated effect on health should
be called probiotics. Live microbes present and traditional fermented foods
and beverages such as kobucha, sauerkraut, and kimchi, typically do
not meet the required evidence level for probiotics, since their
(17:02):
health effects have not been confirmed and the mixtures of
microbes are largely uncharacterized. Probiotics are known by genus, species,
and strain, for example, lactobacillous Acidophilus ABC. The strain designation
is important as different strains of the same species may
have different health effects. A robust safety profile has been
(17:27):
documented in clinical trials for many probiotic strains. However, for
certain at risk populations such as premature infants, immunal compromised individuals,
those with a serious illness, and those with short gut,
certain concerns arise. Mechanisms that drive probiotic benefits are an
(17:48):
active area of research, and in some cases may be known. However,
confirming mechanisms is challenging, and often they remain unconfirmed in humans,
even though health health benefit has been demonstrated. In other words,
we know it helps, we just don't know how. And
that's kind of the stage of research we're at right now.
I think in general, further experts suspect that multiple mechanisms
(18:15):
may act in concert to lisit a health benefit. A
common misconception is that probiotics need to alter the gut
microbiota in order to be effective. In fact, general probotics
have been shown have not been shown to take up
permanent residents in the gut, despite documented health benefits. So
this is one of my issues that I've had here,
(18:38):
which is interesting. So I have always said to people,
you shouldn't be on probiotics in ad infinitum. You know,
it's like, take them when you need them. You're having
some stomach issues, you add about a diarrhea, comes off
with it, Go ahead and take them, taken into box,
take them. But once you've taken them for a couple
of weeks, then it should colonize and grow from there.
(19:02):
But this is saying that doesn't happen. When I looked
at some of the research, it said that about twenty
percent of the population that does happen in but eighty
percent it does not. So if proboducts are helping you,
it may be something to be used long term, which
kind of why I love doing this stuff because that
(19:22):
overturned a lot of my thinking about probiotics. So there
you go, continuing with propoducts. Pandy at all describes probiotics.
The term probiotics is derived from a Greek word meaning
for life, and used to define living, nonpathogenic organisms and
their derived beneficial effects on hosts. Some of the popularly
(19:46):
used probiotic micro microorganisms are Lactopascilla's mnosis, Loactopacill's routery the routeri,
the phytobacteria, and certain strains of lacto Pacillus caci, Loctopacillus, Acidophilis,
Bascillos coagulans. The scherio Coli strain Nissle, nineteen seventeen. That's
(20:07):
an important one because the scherio Coli E. Coli is
often associated with stomach stomach bugs, so this particular strain
is very important if you're going to go down that
road with a scherio Coli, certain Interiococci, especially in terio
Coccus facium s F sixty eight, and the yeast sack sack, Sicaro,
(20:29):
Mice's Ballardi. I kept all those names in there's just
to give myself some tugue twisters. Bacterial spore farmers, mostly
of the genus Bacillis, dominate the scene. These probotics are
added to foods, particularly fermented milk products, either singly or
in combinations. New genera and strains of probotics are continuously
(20:52):
emerging with more advanced and focused research efforts. In other words,
we have a lot more research to do. Probiotic products
may contain either a single strain or mixture of two
or more strains. A single strain may exhibit different benefits
when used individually and in combination. The benefits of a
(21:15):
probiotic formulation also differ with the patient group. Limited studies
that have been performed have shown greater efficacy with multi
strained probiotics, so I tend to be in the camp
of multi strained probiotics personally, though there was some other
research that I said that said basically there's no difference
that single strains are just as good as multi strained probiotics.
(21:39):
I tend to be very much in the multi strained
probiotics category. So there's evidence on both sides, but I
tend to be I think it's stronger with the multi
strain probiotics side, and that is our introduction to probotics.
Are there any questions from anyone listening live to this?
And as we go along, it's again, this is really
(22:01):
hot topic, and I think it will be a really
hot topic for years to come. There's a lot more research.
I'm fascinated with what this is, what we found about
the microbiome and probiotics and prebiotics so far. But I
just I think we're too early with the research as
(22:23):
to what is super beneficial versus not beneficial. In fact,
that's the question where you just ask, is there a
brand in type that I like generally? And the answer
is no, I don't think the research is there. I
just don't. What I will tell you is I got
there's when we get into an individual, when we get
into different types of proboducts and proboducts. One of my
(22:44):
sources is a fantastic website called consumer Lab. I think
it's consumer lab dot com rather than labs. Consumer lab
dot com. You have to pay. They have an annual subscription.
I think it's in the forty to forty five range
at this point, and I always get it every year.
It's a fantastic, uh, fantastic subscription. And he actually it's
(23:06):
it is he doctor Todd Cooperman will actually has great
monographs and a lot of different settlements and he'll take
anywhere from you know, five or six to a couple
dozen products from each category and test them and then
we'll come back and tell you which ones are the best. So, Marie,
you're asking me what I think is the best. My
advice would be to go to Consumer Lab and see
(23:26):
what they think is the best. And they do that,
especially with something like this that's changing a lot, they'll
they'll do it every few years, so it's going to
be relatively up to data as to which brand to get,
and so that that would be my advice, Marie, is
to go check out consumer lab dot com. Okay, with that,
let's get into today's herbs. Today we're gonna be talking
(23:49):
about gal ben or Lugusta chi raizoma. It's from the
family Appasia. It's standard species is lugust to come senensis
o u V here. Remember OUV is about the the
botanists who first classified it, and that is galben. But
there's another species standard species here Lagusticum jiho lends on
(24:11):
nikai and key tag k i t a g. Again,
those are the botanists, and that's the Chinese for that
is leal galben. It is an acceptable species for galben,
but the the more commonly used one is lugust to
come senensus. Now, what's really interesting about this, and I
(24:32):
only got like when I was going like halfway into this,
is this is the same species for another really important
or of Chang Chuan chiang that is legustic comes senensus.
But it's a different cultivar than this, So same species,
different cultivar. Just like we were talking about with the
strains of bacteria, you can think of a cultivar as
(24:54):
kind of a different strain of this species. So very
similar but different. But I Di didn't realize that super
connection because we always learned it in in Chinese medice.
We always learned it as a result of twan shang,
not lugust to come Uh. So it's it's interesting. The
actual Latin name we learned was tron shung, which isn't
(25:18):
the Latin name. It's legusta com And I think it's
because of the overlap here as well, but that does
the same medicinal part between tron Shang and gal Ben
is the rhizome. So that's the part that we're looking at,
is the rhizome. Other names for this is lugusticom Chinese
lugustic come rhizome, Geeho lugust come rhise on. I believe
that would be that second species we mentioned cal Ben,
(25:41):
that's k a O b e n so k camp
can be and Wade Giles, which is a way of
of uh translating the sounds of the Chinese language into
Roman letters. The way we do it today's pinion is
the is across the board the accepted way to do it.
(26:03):
But for for decades it was called it was the
way Giles systems was was used, and in you know
sometimes like the mainland China was Pinion, and then Taiwan
and a lot of scholars were using WAYE Giles, and
so they were used simultaneously. Now everyone's settled on Pinion,
but in the way Giles, k is pronounced with a G,
(26:25):
so gal Ben it even though it's spelled kao, it's
still pronounced gal ben and then uh moving on, there's
other names for this Gui Ching which is ghost Minister
and d Sheen Knew Earth. Both of those were in
the Sheddong Ben Saujing, which we're going to talk about
in just a little bit. Other names include Chwan gal Ben,
(26:48):
Guang Dong gal Ben, Qing Chin, Chiang Tu, Chiang Shei
gal Ben Shi Chiang Chang Galban and in Japanese, again,
I don't ounce I barely pronounce Chinese, and I don't
pronounce Japanese and Crean at all, but in Japanese Cohan
and in Korean coban ko h o n and Japanese
(27:11):
and ko b o n. In Korean we mentioned this
herb is part of the apiassi a family. Ossia family
is the parsley or carrot family, and includes edible plants
and spices such as carrot and parsnip a, nice celery, chervil, coriander, caraway, cumin, dill,
(27:34):
and fenyl. Poisonous hemlock is also a member of this family.
There are about thirty four genera, and one source Elpole
says they are about three hundred genera, so that's a
big difference in three thy seven hundred species. They have
(27:54):
hollow stems, tap roots, and flat topped flower clusters known
as umbols. So taproot is the main root of a
primary root system growing vertically downward. To think of the
carrot is a tap root. A previous name for this
family was the um umbellif ray, referring to these umbols,
(28:17):
which is where the stems of the flower cluster radiate
from a single point at the end of the stock,
kind of like an umbrella. I'm picturing carrots. We have
carrots with the with the the stems and leaves coming
off of it, and that's very much what it looks like.
(28:38):
All right. Going back to our herb, Benski had all
say the dosage is three to nine grams, chen Chen
say three to ten grams, with a maximum of twenty grams.
And Brandon Wiseman say the dose is three to ten grams.
So these are three major textbooks that we look at
for individual herbs. They're both, they're all three of them
(28:58):
are large textbooks from fairly comprehensive in their own ways.
You know, there's differences between them. I love comparison and
comparing the differences between them. But those are three major textbooks,
and so we like to compare. So category Benski and
his team puts this herb in the warm acrid herbs
that release the exterior subcategory under herbs that release the
(29:22):
exterior Chen Chen say it is in the wind cold
releasing herbs subcategory under the exterior releasing herbs category. Sods
Basil are just slight translational differences, and same with Brandon
Wiseman who say it is a warm acrid exterior resolving
medicinal under the exter resolving medicinals category. Benski says it
(29:47):
is acrid and warm and enters the bladder and governing
vessel or Dow channel. Well, neither Chen and Chen or
Brad and Wiseman include the governing vessel, so it's interesting. There's,
as far as I can recall, this is the only
herb that I can think of that talks about entering
the governing vessel or Dew channel or the ren channel
(30:08):
for that matter, which is down the front. So very
odd approach to it. But they make a good case
what we're going to see in the commentary on this
herb history, So no descrepancies here both Benski at all
and Chen and Chen to the original source for this
herb is the Shandong Ben sau Jing or Divine Husbandsman's
Classic of the Material Medica in the second century. See
(30:30):
this book comes up quite a bit. It is the
first book that is existing. There may have been earlier books,
but we don't have them, but we do have this.
We have several translations of this book and it is
the first book on individual herbs written in the second
century CE. So really, basically, if it's in the Shndahng
(30:51):
Ben sau Jing, it means that this herb is among
the earliest that are part of the Chinese medical tradition.
So let's get into this category. We've now discussed this
category in subcategory of verbs several times during adventures examining
Chinese rbs. We will for completeness repeat that information here.
(31:11):
So if you've heard this before, you can fast forward
through it. But it's important information and for completeness we
need to have it here. So, according to Benski and
his team, Extui releasing herbs are those that release disorders
lodged in the very superficial levels of the body when
external pathogenic factors including wind, heat, when cold, when dampness
(31:34):
and summer heat invade the body. They first attack its
superficial exterior aspects. Symptoms associated with the exterior then appear chills, fever, headache,
stiff neck, and general muscle aches. Sometimes sweating will appear,
which resolves the condition, in which case no treatment is necessary.
(31:56):
At other times, however, there will be an absence of sweating,
or even though there is wedding, it is not accompanied
by any change in the condition. At this juncture, herbs
that release the exterior are used. Most exterior releasing herbs
are diaphoretics that as they release or expel the external
pathogenic influences through sweating. There's a sane in Chinese medicine
(32:19):
when the diseases in the skin, sweating will bring it out.
When a disease progresses slightly further into the body is
said to the lodge in the muscle air. The clinical
presentation then includes fever, general body aches, and profuse sweating.
At this stage, especially when the patient is sweated without
any beneficial change in their condition, is appropriate to use
(32:40):
the subset of herbs that release the muscle layer. The
most prominent member of this group is Cinemama ramulus guader,
which is cinnamon twig. Some of the herbs that release
the exter have additional functions stopping coughs and wheezing, controlling
pain or spasms, and venting rashes such as measles. So
(33:03):
that was herbs that release the exterior. Let's talk about
the subcategory. Benski at All continues to discuss the subcarrier
of warm acrid herbs that release the exterior. Herbs that
release the exterior can be further divided by character and
function into warm acrid and cool acrid classes. The warm
acrid herbs dispel wind cold are used for exterior disorders
(33:26):
when the fever is mild, the chills severe, and there
are other signs and symptoms of wind cold including headache,
body and neck pains, and absence of thirst. That's it
for that Subcharacter's not a lot there, and that gives
you a good overview of the herbs, what they do,
(33:48):
the categories that the herb is in. So what does
good quality galband So Benski at All say good quality
consists of big rhizomes with only a few hairy roots
and is intensely aromatic. So we saw that word chiang
kind of pop up quite a bit and as alternative
names for this for this herb, shang means fragrant, so
(34:12):
intensely aromatic. So we have another textbook I'd like to
bring in, which is Chinese medicinal Identification and illustrated Approach.
And this is very good from looking at quality, it's
it's a great book. Different not as heavy on the use,
but more on the identification of herbs. So they say,
(34:32):
Jiao and Chen say who are the authors? That says
gal Ben irregular knotty cylindrical is has an irregular knotty
cylindrical shape, slightly curves with branching externally brown or dark
brown and rough, with a light texture that is hard
(34:53):
and easily broken, and a potent aroma. Again they also
talk about the aroma of this. It has an acrid,
bitter and slightly numbing taste. Superior grade roots are consistent
and have a potent aroma. It has numerous raised dotted
root scars and remnants of roots on one end, logitudinal
(35:18):
wrinkles and remnants of a number of indented round stem
bases on the other end. These are just kind of
classic features of it. So what does it do? What
are its Chinese medical actions? According to Benski and his team,
Galbin discharges exterior conditions and disperses cold for externally contracted
(35:42):
wind cold and especially for headache and nasal congestion as
a magnolia flower power or shin yi san by itself
is used for wind cold lodged in the greater young
with headache involving the crown and vertex or linked to
the teeth and jaw, and dispells wind, overcomes damness and
alleviates pain for wind cold, damp, painful obstruction as well
(36:06):
as acute lower back pain due to invasion of wind cold,
as it treats both ends of the vessel as in
no top to trigium decoction to overcome damness or chiang
kuo hugshi tong also used for damnness affecting the digestive system.
(36:30):
Chun Chen say it releases the exterior, dispels cold, and
dispels wind, cold and damp, and relieves pain. Brandon Wiseman
say it diffuses the exterior and disperses cold, relieves pain,
and dispels, dispels wind, damness, and relieves pain. Chinese Medicinal
Identification Illustrated Approach says it disperses cold, eliminates damness, and
(36:53):
relieves pain. These are all still Chinese medical actions. Kind
of the different sources sendong Ben Saujing again one of
the first books and usually has more of a spiritual
side than a lot of the other textbooks that we
look at. So the Divine Husband's classical of the material
Medica says gal ben is acrid and slightly warm. It
(37:16):
mainly treats mounting conglomeration in genital cold and females swelling
in pain, an abdominal urgency. None of those are really
modern uses of this herb. It eliminates wind headache, promotes
the growth of muscles and skin, and renders the facial
complexion attractive. Well, that's an interesting one. So wind headache
(37:37):
we're going to see is a major function of this
in modern times. Preparations Benski had All says, because it's
aroma is crucial to its efficacy in the clinic. This
herb is always used in its unprepared clean state. In
other words, there's no dry frying, there's no tarrying, there's
no vinegar frying. There's nothing along those lines for the
(37:59):
preparations here. Western uses. Well, several species of Lagusta chi
have medicinal quality and medicinal properties in both Chinese and
Western traditions. Galvin primarily grows in southern China and is
primarily a Chinese herb and a websaritch shielded no traditional
Western uses. The PDR for Herbal Medicines does not mention
(38:21):
this herb at all, so not commonly used in Western herbology.
Benski at All as Usual has an excellent commentary on
this herb quote Lagusta chi riizoma. Galben has acrid, warm, ascending,
and dispersing properties, with a powerful aroma that is quite drying.
(38:46):
Numerous texts record its ability to enter the governing vessel
as well as the bladder channel. Thus it is particularly
good for reaching the vertex of the head, entering all
wind disorders involving the upper posterior aspect of the body.
The relationship of the bladder channel and governing vessel with
the kidneys, however, also allows gal ben to treat lower
(39:07):
back ache and gynecological masses, vaginal swelling or pain from
wind damness in the interior of the body, as well
as relieving headaches involving the teeth. It also relieves acute
abdominal pain and diarrhea associated with lower abdominal wind damness.
So there got we see a lot of that shen
(39:27):
n'ang functions in this commentary, even though it wasn't really
part of the of the functions we talked about earlier,
the actions we talked about earlier. Back to Benski and
his team, it's wind ex filling quality is best expressed
in the upper body, while its ability to dry damness
comes more into play in the lower body. Seeking accuracy
(39:50):
in the Material Metica or the bensa chio Jen by
Huang Goong Shio in seventeen seventy three observes that whenever
you in galban to treat headaches at the vertex, it
should be combined with sepassionate covi of redex pong fung
plus wine fried semisufuga riizoma chang ma and blue pleuri
redex chai whu wine Frying the latter two herbs enhances
(40:15):
their ability to lift the clear young when considering galban
in the treatment of headache at the no longer on
that quote from Seeking accurssy in the Materia Medica. When
considering galban in the treatment of headache at the vertex,
remember that pain in this area can also occur secondary
to a terminal yin disorder, which this herb would be inappropriate.
(40:40):
Additional signs and symptoms of a terminal yen disorder include
dry wretching, bombining of thin sputum, cold hands and feet,
and sometimes diarrhea. The treatment should be to warm and
soothe the stomach and liver, which will dispel the excess
in that is, preventing the clear young from rising. Vodia decoction.
(41:01):
Wuju yutang is the appropriate treatment. As galbin works at
the vertex to eliminate pathogenic win cold rather than to
spell x s hy in, it should be avoided in
these circumstances. That is our commentary comparisons. Both Benski and
(41:22):
his team in chen Chen discuss the use of this
herb for headaches in comparison with other herbs for headaches.
Benski at all says material Medica of Combinations de du
Pei Bun. Bensal Ran in seventeen sixty one notes that
without assistant herbs to guide into the proper channels, no
(41:42):
treatment for headache will be effective. It further states that
galben is best for headaches at the vertex no top
trigi raizoma su redix chiang ho for headaches at the
back of the head, angelica to Hurrica redix bizure for
frontal headaches, and Chuan chiang raisoma chwan for lateral headaches
or any headache involving blood stagnation. And this Tchwan shank
(42:06):
raisomea tron shang is as I mentioned the same species,
but a different cultivar of Galban. Beski continues seeking accuracy
in the material. Medica compares galban and Chwan chung raisoma
tron Chang. We're gonna talk about that right now. One
might say that the nature of galban is really quite
(42:27):
similar to Chchwan shang raisoma tron shang, since they both
treat headache. However, Twan shang raisoma twan chang focuses on
the liver and gall bladder, and although it moves to
the head and eyes, it does not reach the vertex.
Galban focuses on the bladder and governing vessel following them,
(42:47):
and I'm blocking both above and below. But the difference
is that it does not reach the liver in gall bladder.
Sheen Chen and Chen say something similar here about the
headaches gal Ben, Raizoma, Lagusta, Chi Chwan Shang Raisoma gusta, Chi,
Twan Shang, Chiang Hu Raisoma radix, no top to Trijii,
(43:10):
baijer Radix, Angelica to a Hurrica, and Chai who redisplary
all treat headaches, so they're adding in Chai who here.
According to doctor Leoh Lie Sho Sean, the differences differences
between these herbs are as follows. Gal Been is best
for vertex headaches. So now we've seen that several times,
and that is kind of the take home that we're
(43:30):
going to be looking at for this herb is it's
it's great for the vertex headaches. Twanshung is most effective
for headaches related to menstruation, Chiang Ho is more specific
to occipital headaches. Bijur focuses on frontal headaches. Chai Who
treats temporal headaches, so that's really different Twang Shang. According
(43:52):
to Benski at all, Twanshang was good for temporal and
Chi who wasn't even on the list. Uh okay comparisons.
Now we do have a comparison with Chang Huo, which
we've been talking about. No Top Trigii rhizomasu retis chang
Huo is compared with this herb No top trigy Raisomas
(44:15):
suretis is chang huo powerful aroma rises to expel ambulatory
wind in the muscles and exterior. It is best for
neck and shoulder pain, but also for freeing the joints
by venting pathogens from between the sinews and bones. No
top Trigi raisomasu Redis chian Quo and Galben both enter
(44:38):
the governing vessel, but no top Turgi Rhizomas suretis is
chiang quo tendency to move upward is stronger, while Galben
can reach the vertex it is. It is better than
no top Trigi Trigi rhizomasuretics chan quo between lower body disorders.
That's interesting. No top Trigi rahizomasuretics is ch quo ability
(45:01):
to enter the liver and kidney channels refers primarily to
its effect at the sinewed, liver and bone kidney levels
of the joints. So that is our comparisons, and we
can see we have a nice list of herbs we
can use for headache, different types of headaches, and of
(45:21):
course we would never really use just single herbs or
rarely would use single herbs for headaches. So these are
usually parts of formulas as well, and that is our
comparisons combinations Benski at all nor neither Benski at all
nor Chen and Chen discuss any specific combinations of the
cerve with others other than those already mentioned. So we
(45:44):
did mention, Remember we did mention funk funks and passionate
coovia as something that you should always combine with with
calban for vertex headaches. Contents. According to Benski at all,
the contents of this herb include latile oils, lac tones, betastosterol,
which we've we've seen a lot in our herbs and
(46:06):
can have some beneficial effects, and ferulic acid, chin chin ads,
berd gaped in, scopolaitin and vanilla in, so lots of
different things. The volatile ass oils tend to seem to
be what's very important for active ingredients for this particular herb.
(46:30):
There's a long list of volatile oils, and I didn't
want to get so tungued. There were some good names there.
There's a lot of volatils, but that does seem to
be sort of along the primary ingredients that were interested
having medicinal properties for the serb. Let's talk about the science.
According to Chen and Chen, the formacological effects of galbin
(46:54):
include the following actions anti microbial, antipyretic and OIDs. It
reduces fever, anti inflammatory, and potentially inhibit smooth muscle. Now
you might go inhibit smooth muscle. That doesn't sound helpful,
but it can be helpful. That can be helpful as
an anti inflammatory. What it does if an inhibits smooth
(47:14):
muscle is it can prevent dilation of It can dilation
and construction in certain areas of the body, which can
be very beneficial as well. They also discuss a clinical
study galben as part of the formula. As part of
a formula was effective for treating headaches from various causes. Okay,
(47:35):
so that makes sense. This had an end of ninety seven.
I like to include end numbers. It's a number of subjects,
and just as a reminder, whenever we're looking at study,
we should be looking at Larger numbers are better, but
we want at least an end of thirty to forty
because then we can start to apply population statistics to it.
(47:56):
So ninety seven is well above that thirty to forty
sort of threshold. Still relatively small study, especially if you're
treating headaches from various causes. That kind of eliminates, that
kind of creates a lot of variables. So it doesn't
sound like it was a very strong study in general.
Just looking at what was in chen Chen's book, I
(48:19):
did look for reviews. I like review systematic reviews, and
there was one review on Galban that I found, So
let's see what it says, is by Leo at All
in twenty twenty four, and it concluded, considering its traditional
(48:39):
and contemporary applications, phytochemical composition, and pharmacological properties, gal Ben
was regarded as a valuable botanical resource resource for pharmaceutical
and pest control purposes. While certain constituents had demonstrated diverse
pharmacological activities and application potential, further listedation was required to
(49:01):
fully understand their specific actions and underlying mechanisms. Hence there
was a need to conduct additional investigations to uncover its
material for foundation and mode of action. So this review
basically said, hey, this looks very promising, this looks very interesting.
We need a lot more research. And that's a typical
(49:22):
conclusion to a systematic review, but I didn't find this
when this didn't This was not a meta study, it
didn't combine a whole bunch of other studies. So it
was an interesting review and it said pretty much what
all reviews say. It's like, hey, there's some interesting stuff
here we need to do for the research. So not
super strong in its in its benefits, but that's not
(49:46):
surprising to me because this is while a useful Chinese server,
is not one of the most commonly used, and therefore
there's there's not an incentive to do much more research
on it. So there you go. Drug herb interactions. A
literature search did not find interactions between galvin and various
(50:06):
psycrocompany for fifty is des imes or pea glycoprotein, which
are two targets we usually look at for drug urb interactions,
and in align with that, the American Herbal Products Association's
Botanical Safety Handbook puts this herb in interaction Class A
herbs for which no clinical clinically relevant interactions are expected.
(50:26):
So no problem. Let's talk about some concerns. Benski at
All notes several concerns with gal ben under the heading
of cautions and contraindications, they say contradicated for headaches from
blood deficiency or in hot disorders. Under the heading of
traditional contra indications they quote from harm and benefit in
(50:48):
the material Medica or the bensal high Lea from eighteen
ninety three. Because it's powerful rising chi can exhaust blood fluids,
Galvin should not be used for warm disease, headaches, fever
and thirst, or for aching in the bones or injury
from cold in the summer months, headaches from young disorders
(51:09):
or flaring fire, and postpartum blood deficiency, And under the
heading of toxicity, they say there is one reported case
of an allergic skin reaction from ingestion of this herb.
Chen and Chen have some concerns as well. Use of
Galben is contraindicated in patients with heat symptoms or headache
caused by blood deficiency or livery on rising so very
(51:31):
similar galben is acrid and warm and may damage the
yin yin deficient patients should use this herb with caution.
Long term use of galban is not recommended. Brand Wiseman
warns contriunicated in blood vacuity, headache, and heat patterns. And finally,
the American Herbal Products Association's Botanical Safety HAVOC puts the
(51:55):
serb in safety Class one herbs that can be safely
consumed when used a pro prely. In other words, you
know there's enough caution here, like it shouldn't be used
haphazardly for headaches, willy nilly, so, but it can't be
very you know, so you know some level of skill
should be used with this herb. I think, and that
(52:15):
is it for today, Thank you very much. Today we
started our discussion of the microbiome and pre and probiotics.
Then we looked at another single Chinese herb, gal ben
the goosa chi rhizoma or Chinese lovage root. The herb.
This herb is in the Chinese medical subcategory of warm
(52:37):
acro herbs that release the exterior under the category of
released the exterior herbs, and it is helpful for certain
types of colds and especially for alleviating pain and headaches.
And with that we can conclude another deep dive into
the exciting depths of a very useful Chinese herb. Episode
(53:00):
in two weeks is going to be more interesting than
many of the herbs we have looked at. We will
be looking at probably one of the most controversial herbs
today kratam or trag track. I'm going to learn how
to pronounce this before I do it. China, my trag
(53:22):
Guinatraghina speciosa and my t r a g y na
supposed to have pain relieving properties and is banned, are
almost banned in many developed countries. Not banned in the US,
but darn close and in some states. It is. As always,
we will do our deep dive into this herb of
the world and look at its traditional uses, it's preparation,
(53:45):
interactions and cautions, and as usual we will be adding
something a little different. It's going to be another fascinating
exploration into the exciting and potentially dangerous archaeology of herbs.
Please don your cool hat, bring your whip and join
us in two weeks. Thank you very much for listening.
(54:05):
If you like this podcast, please do us a huge
favor subscribe in your favorite podcast up. We really appreciate it,
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don't forget our absolutely amazing continuing education deal at www
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U n C I L dot org. Slash c e
(54:27):
U S one CUS one and you can always get
in touch with me at doctor Greg at sperbserbs dot
com that's s p e r B s h e
r b s dot com, or at our website www
dot sperbserbs dot com. Well, thank you very much, and
(54:48):
as usual we have our bibliography. Thank you. The preceeding
was presented by doctor Greg Sperber would like to thank
Janelle for Awler's support and everybody else who contributed to
this program. Kimothy Roger Campbell, m
That Angelica, Hi, and welcome to Sperbs Herbs Episode ninety five.
We're gonna be talking about Gao ben today, or the
gousta chie raisoma or Chinese lovage root. As always, I'm
your presenter, doctor Greg Sperbert for the ADO. Let's get
(00:25):
into it. Today, we're gonna be dotting our high pressure
suit and diving into another single Chinese herb, gal Ben,
the gousta chi raizoma or Chinese lovage root. This herb
is in the Chinese medical subcategory of warm acrid herbs
that release the exterior. In addition to helping treat external
(00:45):
attacks or colds, it can be helpful in treating pain
and win dampness. And as usual, we explore all the
intricacies of this herb as well as an explanation of
its category. And as always we will be looking we
will look at something a little different. We're going to
look at the microbiome and pre impost biotics. Interesting. This
(01:05):
is a hot topic right now, join us for another
interesting episode. Before we get into that, I just want
to let you know we are having we are starting
an amazing special for our courses if you use them
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We are offering fifty hours of courses for an unbelievable price.
(01:30):
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(02:14):
I'm gonna give you a little hit. There's another deal too.
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Not quite as good, but still amazing, So give it
a shot. Check it. Check it out. Www dot Integrative
Medicinecouncil dot org slash CEUs one hope to see there. Okay,
(02:36):
So for a little something different today, we're going to
talk about the microbiome. I just did. I just presented
a course in my integrative nutrition series looking at pre
impost biotics and digestions, and thought that would make a
great little something different. This is such a hot, hot
topic right now. In fact, as soon as I was
done teaching the course, there were some interesting papers that
came out. Was amazing. So always there's a lot on
(03:01):
this right now because we're learning so much about it.
So any discussion pre or probiotics is predicated on the
concept of the microbiome. The International Scientific Association of Probiotics
and Prebiotics describe the microbiome. Different areas of the human
body digestive track or gut, skin, vaginal track, oral cavity,
(03:24):
and others are home to different communities of microorganisms called microbiotas.
The word microbiome generally refers to the microorganisms in a
defined environment, for example, the human colon, along with the
environment itself. So the microbiota is the organisms living in
(03:45):
a particular environment. All of it together is a microbiome. Well,
microbiome and microbiota are sometimes used interchangeably. Microbiota properly refers
to the microorganisms themselves themselves, bacteria, arkaa, arka, lower and
higher eukaryots, and viruses in a defined environment. Now, if
(04:08):
you're not familiar with this term arka eight arka. I've
seen it written many times, I haven't really heard it
pronounced arka. This is relatively new, only discovered in the
last ten twenty years, and is a whole nother kingdom
of animals. You know how we have plants, and we
have animals and viruses maybe their own kingdom. We have
(04:32):
this arcadia that we just discovered. Really fascinating. And when
I first did this, like just a few weeks ago,
I said, I don't think I've heard of arkaa being
in the microbiome, so I don't know if they're just
talking about arka in general or specifically the microbiome. And
then like just two or three days after I gave
that lecture, I was reading an article on it, and
sure enough they mentioned arka being part of the microbiomes.
(04:54):
So it is part of the microbiome. So very interesting
there and fascinating, way more than we can get into
right here. If you want to learn, I mean This
is stuff when I was going through school didn't exist
at all, so very fascinating, so if you want to
learn more about it, urka. All of these microorganisms comprise
the microbiota. Even though many microbiome studies only focus on
(05:17):
the bacterial components, is now clear that the human microbiota
plays important roles in health and disease. They continue. The
gut microbiota is the most studied microbiotics associated with the
human body, with the digestive track containing the highest density
(05:37):
of human associated microorganisms. Bacteria in the gut harvest energy
from food, produce bioactive substances such as neurotransmitters, enzymes, short
chain fatty acids, and vitamins, play an important role in
programming the immune system and may participate in metabolic functions.
(05:58):
To date, researchers have been un able to define a
healthy gut micro biota because the community of gut microbes
varies greatly among healthy people. Differences in gut microbiota composition
compared to health controls have been demonstrated in people with
various diseases or conditions, but in most cases, microbiotic differences
(06:20):
have not been shown to cause any disease. In other words,
if you have a disease, your microbiota is off, But
just because your microbioda is off doesn't mean it's causing
the disease. It might eight we're still investigating them, but
there's no evidence of that at this point. Diet and
medications are important factors that account for gut microbiotic variability
(06:43):
in large cohort studies. Antibiotics are a particularly powerful way
to alter the gut microbiota. When someone is on antibiotics,
the microbial community is altered drastically throughout the course of
the medication, but microbes typically return to the baseline levels
or close to baseline levels after the treatment ends. In
(07:04):
other words, may not be a long term issue at all.
Dietary changes may also modulate the gut microbiota. Probiotics, probiotics,
fermnted foods, and fiber are dietary means of influencing the
gut microbiota composition or metabolic activities. Indeed, probiotics in particular
(07:28):
must by definition, have a mechanism of action that involves
their selective utilization by gut micro organisms. In other words,
it's got to be used, it's got to do something.
I think this is a great introduction into the gut microbiome,
which is what we're concentrating on today. Particularly like something
that says researchers have been unable to define a healthy
(07:51):
gut microbiota because the community of gut microbes varies greatly
among healthy people. This is probably a function the current
state of research, and hopefully we will learn more about
what is a healthy biome versus an unhealthy one and
how we can intervene to help make and sustain a
healthy biome. But we are not there yet, and that
(08:15):
is where a lot of the issues come from. With
the biotics we are going to discuss to a certain extent,
this is my main issue. It's like, I think we've
established that the microbiome is incredibly important for our health,
that it affects a lot of things about us. We
found out it can play a role in depression, anxiety,
in our immune system, as well as just our ability
(08:38):
to bring in nutrients and things along those lines. It
is absolutely very important. We've established that pretty well at
this point. What we haven't established is what is a
healthy microbiome? How do we change an unhealthy microbiome into
a healthy one? And you know, those are the two
major factors here, and we don't know how to do
(09:00):
these yet. And yet there's a lot of supplements out
there that say, hey, you need to be taking us
in order to have a healthy microbiome, which is not true.
It is not established. They've done studies, yes, and all
the studies which I get into with this course, I
get into this studies quite a bit. This Ingram nutrition
course that I developed, We're not gonna do that today.
(09:21):
But when we look at the studies that are talking about,
you know, this particular strain of probiotics or probiotics is
very helpful for this. Almost all of them are small
and are paid for by the manufacturers of those products.
And something that I haven't seen, which we really desperately need,
is a comparison. Instead of saying strain XYZ does all
(09:46):
these great things, what we need to do is say
strain ABC versus strained DEF versus strain x y Z
versus strain q QBC, whatever it is, all these strains together,
this is the best one. This is the one that
as the most for micro We don't have studies that
I've seen that do any of that, and so I
really feel like we're living in the wild West. When
(10:08):
it comes to the microbiome, we don't know what works
what doesn't work. We do know there's probably some positive
things with using it. I'm not anti probiotic. I'm just
very skeptical about what people are saying about individual products. Okay,
so that's our introduction. Let's continue with prebiotics. What are
(10:29):
we mentioned probiotics. We mentioned probiotics. What are they? So?
The Male Clinic says probiotics are foods, typically high fiber foods,
that acts as food for human microflora. Prebiotics are used
with the intention of improving the balance of these micro organisms.
Health Wine similarly says probiotics are high fiber foods that
(10:53):
serve as food for probiotics, allowing them to function properly
and effectively. Examples of prebiotic foods are fruits, vegetables, and
whole grains. Sounds like a healthy diet to begin with
our Koeak and sleez Zuez. Sleez Zeuska gives a more
(11:13):
scientific overview. In nineteen ninety five, probiotics were defined by
Gibson and on Roberfreud as non digested food components that
through the stimulation of growth and or activity of a
single type or limited amount of microorganisms residing in the
gastroom intestinal tract improve the health condition of a host.
(11:34):
In two thousand and seven FAO, which I can't remember
what that sends for the WHO and WHO World Health
Organization experts described probiotics as a non viable food component
that confers a health benefit on the host associated with
modulation of the microbiota. Probiotics may be used as an
alternative to probiotics or as an additional support for them. However,
(11:58):
different probioducts will still emulate the growth of different indigenous
gut bacteria. Prebiotics have enormous potential for modifying the gut microbiota,
but these modifications occur at the level of individual strains
in species and are not easily predicted a priority in
other words, ahead of time. There are many reports on
(12:21):
the beneficial effects of prebiotics on human health, and I
agree with that those studies are pretty positive with it,
but again we don't know which ones do exactly what.
The International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Probiotics we talked
about this earlier ice APP says the current scientific definition
of a prebiotic was developed by a panel of experts
in microbiology, nutrition, and clinical research convened by ice APP
(12:44):
in twenty sixteen. This current consensus definition is quote a
substrate that is selectively utilized by host microorganisms, conferring a
health benefit. Thus, the concepts three essential parts a substance,
a physiological beneficial effect, and a microbiotic mediated mechanism. Prebiotics
(13:08):
are frequently equated with dietary fibers, but only a subset
of dietary fibers actually qualify as prebiotics, and indeed prebiotics
may derive from non fiber substances such as polyphenols. According
to the scientific consensus definition, a prebiotic compound must confer
(13:28):
a beneficial physiological effect on the host, and that effect
should derive at least in part from utilization of the
compound by resident microbes. However, to qualify under this definition,
the prebiotic substance must affect a limited group of microorganisms
in the host rather than the entire microbial ecosystem, thereby
(13:52):
meeting the criterion of being selectively utilized. Prebiotics may be
present naturally or insynthesized forms. The majority of research into
their health effects has focused on isolated substances to allow
for tire control of substance in DOST and less on
(14:15):
probiotics as part of whole plant foods. Okay, whole plant foods.
That sounds a lot like herbs there, so you know
herbs can play a role in prebiotics. Get into that.
Maybe not so much here, but in the big when
I did my whole course. Probiotics have been studied for
certain health effects such as reduction of infections, cardio metabolic health,
(14:37):
mineral availability, and immune modulation. The most commonly studied probiotics
are the soluble fibers inuline fructo oligo sacharides or foss
galacto oligo sacrides are Geos's and more recently human milk
oligosaccharides HMOs so glactago. The gos glactogo psacharides are also
(15:02):
They're not human milk, but they are milk oligosaccharides well.
The probiotic substances with the most well documented health effects
to date are fermentable carbohydrates in the gut. The consensus
definition allows for a broad range of substances targeting different
host niches, such as the mouth, skin, or eurogenital tract
to be considered prebiotics given appropriate scientific support. And that's
(15:29):
an overview of probiotics. Let's talk about probiotics. So again,
that same organization, the International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Probiotics,
also has a great introduction to probiotics. Quote. The term
probiotic was defined in two thousand and one by an
expert consultation of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the
United Nations and the World Health Organizations that's FAO and WHO.
(15:53):
In twenty thirteen, ice APP convened in expert panel to
review the term probiotic in literature surrounding it. The net
result was a publication reiterating the definition with minor grammatical changes.
Live quote live microorganisms that, when administered in adequate amounts,
confer a health benefit on the host. So live microorganisms
(16:18):
are important. We're not going to talk about post biotics here,
but that is what separates probiotics from post biotics. Post
biotics or when there are no live micro organisms and
yet a lot of the same substances are still there.
I continues, this is widely accepted. This is the widely
accepted scientific definition of probotics around the world. Live microorganisms
(16:41):
may be present in many foods and supplements, but only
characterized strains with a scientifically demonstrated effect on health should
be called probiotics. Live microbes present and traditional fermented foods
and beverages such as kobucha, sauerkraut, and kimchi, typically do
not meet the required evidence level for probiotics, since their
(17:02):
health effects have not been confirmed and the mixtures of
microbes are largely uncharacterized. Probiotics are known by genus, species,
and strain, for example, lactobacillous Acidophilus ABC. The strain designation
is important as different strains of the same species may
have different health effects. A robust safety profile has been
(17:27):
documented in clinical trials for many probiotic strains. However, for
certain at risk populations such as premature infants, immunal compromised individuals,
those with a serious illness, and those with short gut,
certain concerns arise. Mechanisms that drive probiotic benefits are an
(17:48):
active area of research, and in some cases may be known. However,
confirming mechanisms is challenging, and often they remain unconfirmed in humans,
even though health health benefit has been demonstrated. In other words,
we know it helps, we just don't know how. And
that's kind of the stage of research we're at right now.
I think in general, further experts suspect that multiple mechanisms
(18:15):
may act in concert to lisit a health benefit. A
common misconception is that probiotics need to alter the gut
microbiota in order to be effective. In fact, general probotics
have been shown have not been shown to take up
permanent residents in the gut, despite documented health benefits. So
this is one of my issues that I've had here,
(18:38):
which is interesting. So I have always said to people,
you shouldn't be on probiotics in ad infinitum. You know,
it's like, take them when you need them. You're having
some stomach issues, you add about a diarrhea, comes off
with it, Go ahead and take them, taken into box,
take them. But once you've taken them for a couple
of weeks, then it should colonize and grow from there.
(19:02):
But this is saying that doesn't happen. When I looked
at some of the research, it said that about twenty
percent of the population that does happen in but eighty
percent it does not. So if proboducts are helping you,
it may be something to be used long term, which
kind of why I love doing this stuff because that
(19:22):
overturned a lot of my thinking about probiotics. So there
you go, continuing with propoducts. Pandy at all describes probiotics.
The term probiotics is derived from a Greek word meaning
for life, and used to define living, nonpathogenic organisms and
their derived beneficial effects on hosts. Some of the popularly
(19:46):
used probiotic micro microorganisms are Lactopascilla's mnosis, Loactopacill's routery the routeri,
the phytobacteria, and certain strains of lacto Pacillus caci, Loctopacillus, Acidophilis,
Bascillos coagulans. The scherio Coli strain Nissle, nineteen seventeen. That's
(20:07):
an important one because the scherio Coli E. Coli is
often associated with stomach stomach bugs, so this particular strain
is very important if you're going to go down that
road with a scherio Coli, certain Interiococci, especially in terio
Coccus facium s F sixty eight, and the yeast sack sack, Sicaro,
(20:29):
Mice's Ballardi. I kept all those names in there's just
to give myself some tugue twisters. Bacterial spore farmers, mostly
of the genus Bacillis, dominate the scene. These probotics are
added to foods, particularly fermented milk products, either singly or
in combinations. New genera and strains of probotics are continuously
(20:52):
emerging with more advanced and focused research efforts. In other words,
we have a lot more research to do. Probiotic products
may contain either a single strain or mixture of two
or more strains. A single strain may exhibit different benefits
when used individually and in combination. The benefits of a
(21:15):
probiotic formulation also differ with the patient group. Limited studies
that have been performed have shown greater efficacy with multi
strained probiotics, so I tend to be in the camp
of multi strained probiotics personally, though there was some other
research that I said that said basically there's no difference
that single strains are just as good as multi strained probiotics.
(21:39):
I tend to be very much in the multi strained
probiotics category. So there's evidence on both sides, but I
tend to be I think it's stronger with the multi
strain probiotics side, and that is our introduction to probotics.
Are there any questions from anyone listening live to this?
And as we go along, it's again, this is really
(22:01):
hot topic, and I think it will be a really
hot topic for years to come. There's a lot more research.
I'm fascinated with what this is, what we found about
the microbiome and probiotics and prebiotics so far. But I
just I think we're too early with the research as
(22:23):
to what is super beneficial versus not beneficial. In fact,
that's the question where you just ask, is there a
brand in type that I like generally? And the answer
is no, I don't think the research is there. I
just don't. What I will tell you is I got
there's when we get into an individual, when we get
into different types of proboducts and proboducts. One of my
(22:44):
sources is a fantastic website called consumer Lab. I think
it's consumer lab dot com rather than labs. Consumer lab
dot com. You have to pay. They have an annual subscription.
I think it's in the forty to forty five range
at this point, and I always get it every year.
It's a fantastic, uh, fantastic subscription. And he actually it's
(23:06):
it is he doctor Todd Cooperman will actually has great
monographs and a lot of different settlements and he'll take
anywhere from you know, five or six to a couple
dozen products from each category and test them and then
we'll come back and tell you which ones are the best. So, Marie,
you're asking me what I think is the best. My
advice would be to go to Consumer Lab and see
(23:26):
what they think is the best. And they do that,
especially with something like this that's changing a lot, they'll
they'll do it every few years, so it's going to
be relatively up to data as to which brand to get,
and so that that would be my advice, Marie, is
to go check out consumer lab dot com. Okay, with that,
let's get into today's herbs. Today we're gonna be talking
(23:49):
about gal ben or Lugusta chi raizoma. It's from the
family Appasia. It's standard species is lugust to come senensis
o u V here. Remember OUV is about the the
botanists who first classified it, and that is galben. But
there's another species standard species here Lagusticum jiho lends on
(24:11):
nikai and key tag k i t a g. Again,
those are the botanists, and that's the Chinese for that
is leal galben. It is an acceptable species for galben,
but the the more commonly used one is lugust to
come senensus. Now, what's really interesting about this, and I
(24:32):
only got like when I was going like halfway into this,
is this is the same species for another really important
or of Chang Chuan chiang that is legustic comes senensus.
But it's a different cultivar than this, So same species,
different cultivar. Just like we were talking about with the
strains of bacteria, you can think of a cultivar as
(24:54):
kind of a different strain of this species. So very
similar but different. But I Di didn't realize that super
connection because we always learned it in in Chinese medice.
We always learned it as a result of twan shang,
not lugust to come Uh. So it's it's interesting. The
actual Latin name we learned was tron shung, which isn't
(25:18):
the Latin name. It's legusta com And I think it's
because of the overlap here as well, but that does
the same medicinal part between tron Shang and gal Ben
is the rhizome. So that's the part that we're looking at,
is the rhizome. Other names for this is lugusticom Chinese
lugustic come rhizome, Geeho lugust come rhise on. I believe
that would be that second species we mentioned cal Ben,
(25:41):
that's k a O b e n so k camp
can be and Wade Giles, which is a way of
of uh translating the sounds of the Chinese language into
Roman letters. The way we do it today's pinion is
the is across the board the accepted way to do it.
(26:03):
But for for decades it was called it was the
way Giles systems was was used, and in you know
sometimes like the mainland China was Pinion, and then Taiwan
and a lot of scholars were using WAYE Giles, and
so they were used simultaneously. Now everyone's settled on Pinion,
but in the way Giles, k is pronounced with a G,
(26:25):
so gal Ben it even though it's spelled kao, it's
still pronounced gal ben and then uh moving on, there's
other names for this Gui Ching which is ghost Minister
and d Sheen Knew Earth. Both of those were in
the Sheddong Ben Saujing, which we're going to talk about
in just a little bit. Other names include Chwan gal Ben,
(26:48):
Guang Dong gal Ben, Qing Chin, Chiang Tu, Chiang Shei
gal Ben Shi Chiang Chang Galban and in Japanese, again,
I don't ounce I barely pronounce Chinese, and I don't
pronounce Japanese and Crean at all, but in Japanese Cohan
and in Korean coban ko h o n and Japanese
(27:11):
and ko b o n. In Korean we mentioned this
herb is part of the apiassi a family. Ossia family
is the parsley or carrot family, and includes edible plants
and spices such as carrot and parsnip a, nice celery, chervil, coriander, caraway, cumin, dill,
(27:34):
and fenyl. Poisonous hemlock is also a member of this family.
There are about thirty four genera, and one source Elpole
says they are about three hundred genera, so that's a
big difference in three thy seven hundred species. They have
(27:54):
hollow stems, tap roots, and flat topped flower clusters known
as umbols. So taproot is the main root of a
primary root system growing vertically downward. To think of the
carrot is a tap root. A previous name for this
family was the um umbellif ray, referring to these umbols,
(28:17):
which is where the stems of the flower cluster radiate
from a single point at the end of the stock,
kind of like an umbrella. I'm picturing carrots. We have
carrots with the with the the stems and leaves coming
off of it, and that's very much what it looks like.
(28:38):
All right. Going back to our herb, Benski had all
say the dosage is three to nine grams, chen Chen
say three to ten grams, with a maximum of twenty grams.
And Brandon Wiseman say the dose is three to ten grams.
So these are three major textbooks that we look at
for individual herbs. They're both, they're all three of them
(28:58):
are large textbooks from fairly comprehensive in their own ways.
You know, there's differences between them. I love comparison and
comparing the differences between them. But those are three major textbooks,
and so we like to compare. So category Benski and
his team puts this herb in the warm acrid herbs
that release the exterior subcategory under herbs that release the
(29:22):
exterior Chen Chen say it is in the wind cold
releasing herbs subcategory under the exterior releasing herbs category. Sods
Basil are just slight translational differences, and same with Brandon
Wiseman who say it is a warm acrid exterior resolving
medicinal under the exter resolving medicinals category. Benski says it
(29:47):
is acrid and warm and enters the bladder and governing
vessel or Dow channel. Well, neither Chen and Chen or
Brad and Wiseman include the governing vessel, so it's interesting. There's,
as far as I can recall, this is the only
herb that I can think of that talks about entering
the governing vessel or Dew channel or the ren channel
(30:08):
for that matter, which is down the front. So very
odd approach to it. But they make a good case
what we're going to see in the commentary on this
herb history, So no descrepancies here both Benski at all
and Chen and Chen to the original source for this
herb is the Shandong Ben sau Jing or Divine Husbandsman's
Classic of the Material Medica in the second century. See
(30:30):
this book comes up quite a bit. It is the
first book that is existing. There may have been earlier books,
but we don't have them, but we do have this.
We have several translations of this book and it is
the first book on individual herbs written in the second
century CE. So really, basically, if it's in the Shndahng
(30:51):
Ben sau Jing, it means that this herb is among
the earliest that are part of the Chinese medical tradition.
So let's get into this category. We've now discussed this
category in subcategory of verbs several times during adventures examining
Chinese rbs. We will for completeness repeat that information here.
(31:11):
So if you've heard this before, you can fast forward
through it. But it's important information and for completeness we
need to have it here. So, according to Benski and
his team, Extui releasing herbs are those that release disorders
lodged in the very superficial levels of the body when
external pathogenic factors including wind, heat, when cold, when dampness
(31:34):
and summer heat invade the body. They first attack its
superficial exterior aspects. Symptoms associated with the exterior then appear chills, fever, headache,
stiff neck, and general muscle aches. Sometimes sweating will appear,
which resolves the condition, in which case no treatment is necessary.
(31:56):
At other times, however, there will be an absence of sweating,
or even though there is wedding, it is not accompanied
by any change in the condition. At this juncture, herbs
that release the exterior are used. Most exterior releasing herbs
are diaphoretics that as they release or expel the external
pathogenic influences through sweating. There's a sane in Chinese medicine
(32:19):
when the diseases in the skin, sweating will bring it out.
When a disease progresses slightly further into the body is
said to the lodge in the muscle air. The clinical
presentation then includes fever, general body aches, and profuse sweating.
At this stage, especially when the patient is sweated without
any beneficial change in their condition, is appropriate to use
(32:40):
the subset of herbs that release the muscle layer. The
most prominent member of this group is Cinemama ramulus guader,
which is cinnamon twig. Some of the herbs that release
the exter have additional functions stopping coughs and wheezing, controlling
pain or spasms, and venting rashes such as measles. So
(33:03):
that was herbs that release the exterior. Let's talk about
the subcategory. Benski at All continues to discuss the subcarrier
of warm acrid herbs that release the exterior. Herbs that
release the exterior can be further divided by character and
function into warm acrid and cool acrid classes. The warm
acrid herbs dispel wind cold are used for exterior disorders
(33:26):
when the fever is mild, the chills severe, and there
are other signs and symptoms of wind cold including headache,
body and neck pains, and absence of thirst. That's it
for that Subcharacter's not a lot there, and that gives
you a good overview of the herbs, what they do,
(33:48):
the categories that the herb is in. So what does
good quality galband So Benski at All say good quality
consists of big rhizomes with only a few hairy roots
and is intensely aromatic. So we saw that word chiang
kind of pop up quite a bit and as alternative
names for this for this herb, shang means fragrant, so
(34:12):
intensely aromatic. So we have another textbook I'd like to
bring in, which is Chinese medicinal Identification and illustrated Approach.
And this is very good from looking at quality, it's
it's a great book. Different not as heavy on the use,
but more on the identification of herbs. So they say,
(34:32):
Jiao and Chen say who are the authors? That says
gal Ben irregular knotty cylindrical is has an irregular knotty
cylindrical shape, slightly curves with branching externally brown or dark
brown and rough, with a light texture that is hard
(34:53):
and easily broken, and a potent aroma. Again they also
talk about the aroma of this. It has an acrid,
bitter and slightly numbing taste. Superior grade roots are consistent
and have a potent aroma. It has numerous raised dotted
root scars and remnants of roots on one end, logitudinal
(35:18):
wrinkles and remnants of a number of indented round stem
bases on the other end. These are just kind of
classic features of it. So what does it do? What
are its Chinese medical actions? According to Benski and his team,
Galbin discharges exterior conditions and disperses cold for externally contracted
(35:42):
wind cold and especially for headache and nasal congestion as
a magnolia flower power or shin yi san by itself
is used for wind cold lodged in the greater young
with headache involving the crown and vertex or linked to
the teeth and jaw, and dispells wind, overcomes damness and
alleviates pain for wind cold, damp, painful obstruction as well
(36:06):
as acute lower back pain due to invasion of wind cold,
as it treats both ends of the vessel as in
no top to trigium decoction to overcome damness or chiang
kuo hugshi tong also used for damnness affecting the digestive system.
(36:30):
Chun Chen say it releases the exterior, dispels cold, and
dispels wind, cold and damp, and relieves pain. Brandon Wiseman
say it diffuses the exterior and disperses cold, relieves pain,
and dispels, dispels wind, damness, and relieves pain. Chinese Medicinal
Identification Illustrated Approach says it disperses cold, eliminates damness, and
(36:53):
relieves pain. These are all still Chinese medical actions. Kind
of the different sources sendong Ben Saujing again one of
the first books and usually has more of a spiritual
side than a lot of the other textbooks that we
look at. So the Divine Husband's classical of the material
Medica says gal ben is acrid and slightly warm. It
(37:16):
mainly treats mounting conglomeration in genital cold and females swelling
in pain, an abdominal urgency. None of those are really
modern uses of this herb. It eliminates wind headache, promotes
the growth of muscles and skin, and renders the facial
complexion attractive. Well, that's an interesting one. So wind headache
(37:37):
we're going to see is a major function of this
in modern times. Preparations Benski had All says, because it's
aroma is crucial to its efficacy in the clinic. This
herb is always used in its unprepared clean state. In
other words, there's no dry frying, there's no tarrying, there's
no vinegar frying. There's nothing along those lines for the
(37:59):
preparations here. Western uses. Well, several species of Lagusta chi
have medicinal quality and medicinal properties in both Chinese and
Western traditions. Galvin primarily grows in southern China and is
primarily a Chinese herb and a websaritch shielded no traditional
Western uses. The PDR for Herbal Medicines does not mention
(38:21):
this herb at all, so not commonly used in Western herbology.
Benski at All as Usual has an excellent commentary on
this herb quote Lagusta chi riizoma. Galben has acrid, warm, ascending,
and dispersing properties, with a powerful aroma that is quite drying.
(38:46):
Numerous texts record its ability to enter the governing vessel
as well as the bladder channel. Thus it is particularly
good for reaching the vertex of the head, entering all
wind disorders involving the upper posterior aspect of the body.
The relationship of the bladder channel and governing vessel with
the kidneys, however, also allows gal ben to treat lower
(39:07):
back ache and gynecological masses, vaginal swelling or pain from
wind damness in the interior of the body, as well
as relieving headaches involving the teeth. It also relieves acute
abdominal pain and diarrhea associated with lower abdominal wind damness.
So there got we see a lot of that shen
(39:27):
n'ang functions in this commentary, even though it wasn't really
part of the of the functions we talked about earlier,
the actions we talked about earlier. Back to Benski and
his team, it's wind ex filling quality is best expressed
in the upper body, while its ability to dry damness
comes more into play in the lower body. Seeking accuracy
(39:50):
in the Material Metica or the bensa chio Jen by
Huang Goong Shio in seventeen seventy three observes that whenever
you in galban to treat headaches at the vertex, it
should be combined with sepassionate covi of redex pong fung
plus wine fried semisufuga riizoma chang ma and blue pleuri
redex chai whu wine Frying the latter two herbs enhances
(40:15):
their ability to lift the clear young when considering galban
in the treatment of headache at the no longer on
that quote from Seeking accurssy in the Materia Medica. When
considering galban in the treatment of headache at the vertex,
remember that pain in this area can also occur secondary
to a terminal yin disorder, which this herb would be inappropriate.
(40:40):
Additional signs and symptoms of a terminal yen disorder include
dry wretching, bombining of thin sputum, cold hands and feet,
and sometimes diarrhea. The treatment should be to warm and
soothe the stomach and liver, which will dispel the excess
in that is, preventing the clear young from rising. Vodia decoction.
(41:01):
Wuju yutang is the appropriate treatment. As galbin works at
the vertex to eliminate pathogenic win cold rather than to
spell x s hy in, it should be avoided in
these circumstances. That is our commentary comparisons. Both Benski and
(41:22):
his team in chen Chen discuss the use of this
herb for headaches in comparison with other herbs for headaches.
Benski at all says material Medica of Combinations de du
Pei Bun. Bensal Ran in seventeen sixty one notes that
without assistant herbs to guide into the proper channels, no
(41:42):
treatment for headache will be effective. It further states that
galben is best for headaches at the vertex no top
trigi raizoma su redix chiang ho for headaches at the
back of the head, angelica to Hurrica redix bizure for
frontal headaches, and Chuan chiang raisoma chwan for lateral headaches
or any headache involving blood stagnation. And this Tchwan shank
(42:06):
raisomea tron shang is as I mentioned the same species,
but a different cultivar of Galban. Beski continues seeking accuracy
in the material. Medica compares galban and Chwan chung raisoma
tron Chang. We're gonna talk about that right now. One
might say that the nature of galban is really quite
(42:27):
similar to Chchwan shang raisoma tron shang, since they both
treat headache. However, Twan shang raisoma twan chang focuses on
the liver and gall bladder, and although it moves to
the head and eyes, it does not reach the vertex.
Galban focuses on the bladder and governing vessel following them,
(42:47):
and I'm blocking both above and below. But the difference
is that it does not reach the liver in gall bladder.
Sheen Chen and Chen say something similar here about the
headaches gal Ben, Raizoma, Lagusta, Chi Chwan Shang Raisoma gusta, Chi,
Twan Shang, Chiang Hu Raisoma radix, no top to Trijii,
(43:10):
baijer Radix, Angelica to a Hurrica, and Chai who redisplary
all treat headaches, so they're adding in Chai who here.
According to doctor Leoh Lie Sho Sean, the differences differences
between these herbs are as follows. Gal Been is best
for vertex headaches. So now we've seen that several times,
and that is kind of the take home that we're
(43:30):
going to be looking at for this herb is it's
it's great for the vertex headaches. Twanshung is most effective
for headaches related to menstruation, Chiang Ho is more specific
to occipital headaches. Bijur focuses on frontal headaches. Chai Who
treats temporal headaches, so that's really different Twang Shang. According
(43:52):
to Benski at all, Twanshang was good for temporal and
Chi who wasn't even on the list. Uh okay comparisons.
Now we do have a comparison with Chang Huo, which
we've been talking about. No Top Trigii rhizomasu retis chang
Huo is compared with this herb No top trigy Raisomas
(44:15):
suretis is chang huo powerful aroma rises to expel ambulatory
wind in the muscles and exterior. It is best for
neck and shoulder pain, but also for freeing the joints
by venting pathogens from between the sinews and bones. No
top Trigi raisomasu Redis chian Quo and Galben both enter
(44:38):
the governing vessel, but no top Turgi Rhizomas suretis is
chiang quo tendency to move upward is stronger, while Galben
can reach the vertex it is. It is better than
no top Trigi Trigi rhizomasuretics chan quo between lower body disorders.
That's interesting. No top Trigi rahizomasuretics is ch quo ability
(45:01):
to enter the liver and kidney channels refers primarily to
its effect at the sinewed, liver and bone kidney levels
of the joints. So that is our comparisons, and we
can see we have a nice list of herbs we
can use for headache, different types of headaches, and of
(45:21):
course we would never really use just single herbs or
rarely would use single herbs for headaches. So these are
usually parts of formulas as well, and that is our
comparisons combinations Benski at all nor neither Benski at all
nor Chen and Chen discuss any specific combinations of the
cerve with others other than those already mentioned. So we
(45:44):
did mention, Remember we did mention funk funks and passionate
coovia as something that you should always combine with with
calban for vertex headaches. Contents. According to Benski at all,
the contents of this herb include latile oils, lac tones, betastosterol,
which we've we've seen a lot in our herbs and
(46:06):
can have some beneficial effects, and ferulic acid, chin chin ads,
berd gaped in, scopolaitin and vanilla in, so lots of
different things. The volatile ass oils tend to seem to
be what's very important for active ingredients for this particular herb.
(46:30):
There's a long list of volatile oils, and I didn't
want to get so tungued. There were some good names there.
There's a lot of volatils, but that does seem to
be sort of along the primary ingredients that were interested
having medicinal properties for the serb. Let's talk about the science.
According to Chen and Chen, the formacological effects of galbin
(46:54):
include the following actions anti microbial, antipyretic and OIDs. It
reduces fever, anti inflammatory, and potentially inhibit smooth muscle. Now
you might go inhibit smooth muscle. That doesn't sound helpful,
but it can be helpful. That can be helpful as
an anti inflammatory. What it does if an inhibits smooth
(47:14):
muscle is it can prevent dilation of It can dilation
and construction in certain areas of the body, which can
be very beneficial as well. They also discuss a clinical
study galben as part of the formula. As part of
a formula was effective for treating headaches from various causes. Okay,
(47:35):
so that makes sense. This had an end of ninety seven.
I like to include end numbers. It's a number of subjects,
and just as a reminder, whenever we're looking at study,
we should be looking at Larger numbers are better, but
we want at least an end of thirty to forty
because then we can start to apply population statistics to it.
(47:56):
So ninety seven is well above that thirty to forty
sort of threshold. Still relatively small study, especially if you're
treating headaches from various causes. That kind of eliminates, that
kind of creates a lot of variables. So it doesn't
sound like it was a very strong study in general.
Just looking at what was in chen Chen's book, I
(48:19):
did look for reviews. I like review systematic reviews, and
there was one review on Galban that I found, So
let's see what it says, is by Leo at All
in twenty twenty four, and it concluded, considering its traditional
(48:39):
and contemporary applications, phytochemical composition, and pharmacological properties, gal Ben
was regarded as a valuable botanical resource resource for pharmaceutical
and pest control purposes. While certain constituents had demonstrated diverse
pharmacological activities and application potential, further listedation was required to
(49:01):
fully understand their specific actions and underlying mechanisms. Hence there
was a need to conduct additional investigations to uncover its
material for foundation and mode of action. So this review
basically said, hey, this looks very promising, this looks very interesting.
We need a lot more research. And that's a typical
(49:22):
conclusion to a systematic review, but I didn't find this
when this didn't This was not a meta study, it
didn't combine a whole bunch of other studies. So it
was an interesting review and it said pretty much what
all reviews say. It's like, hey, there's some interesting stuff
here we need to do for the research. So not
super strong in its in its benefits, but that's not
(49:46):
surprising to me because this is while a useful Chinese server,
is not one of the most commonly used, and therefore
there's there's not an incentive to do much more research
on it. So there you go. Drug herb interactions. A
literature search did not find interactions between galvin and various
(50:06):
psycrocompany for fifty is des imes or pea glycoprotein, which
are two targets we usually look at for drug urb interactions,
and in align with that, the American Herbal Products Association's
Botanical Safety Handbook puts this herb in interaction Class A
herbs for which no clinical clinically relevant interactions are expected.
(50:26):
So no problem. Let's talk about some concerns. Benski at
All notes several concerns with gal ben under the heading
of cautions and contraindications, they say contradicated for headaches from
blood deficiency or in hot disorders. Under the heading of
traditional contra indications they quote from harm and benefit in
(50:48):
the material Medica or the bensal high Lea from eighteen
ninety three. Because it's powerful rising chi can exhaust blood fluids,
Galvin should not be used for warm disease, headaches, fever
and thirst, or for aching in the bones or injury
from cold in the summer months, headaches from young disorders
(51:09):
or flaring fire, and postpartum blood deficiency, And under the
heading of toxicity, they say there is one reported case
of an allergic skin reaction from ingestion of this herb.
Chen and Chen have some concerns as well. Use of
Galben is contraindicated in patients with heat symptoms or headache
caused by blood deficiency or livery on rising so very
(51:31):
similar galben is acrid and warm and may damage the
yin yin deficient patients should use this herb with caution.
Long term use of galban is not recommended. Brand Wiseman
warns contriunicated in blood vacuity, headache, and heat patterns. And finally,
the American Herbal Products Association's Botanical Safety HAVOC puts the
(51:55):
serb in safety Class one herbs that can be safely
consumed when used a pro prely. In other words, you
know there's enough caution here, like it shouldn't be used
haphazardly for headaches, willy nilly, so, but it can't be
very you know, so you know some level of skill
should be used with this herb. I think, and that
(52:15):
is it for today, Thank you very much. Today we
started our discussion of the microbiome and pre and probiotics.
Then we looked at another single Chinese herb, gal ben
the goosa chi rhizoma or Chinese lovage root. The herb.
This herb is in the Chinese medical subcategory of warm
(52:37):
acro herbs that release the exterior under the category of
released the exterior herbs, and it is helpful for certain
types of colds and especially for alleviating pain and headaches.
And with that we can conclude another deep dive into
the exciting depths of a very useful Chinese herb. Episode
(53:00):
in two weeks is going to be more interesting than
many of the herbs we have looked at. We will
be looking at probably one of the most controversial herbs
today kratam or trag track. I'm going to learn how
to pronounce this before I do it. China, my trag
(53:22):
Guinatraghina speciosa and my t r a g y na
supposed to have pain relieving properties and is banned, are
almost banned in many developed countries. Not banned in the US,
but darn close and in some states. It is. As always,
we will do our deep dive into this herb of
the world and look at its traditional uses, it's preparation,
(53:45):
interactions and cautions, and as usual we will be adding
something a little different. It's going to be another fascinating
exploration into the exciting and potentially dangerous archaeology of herbs.
Please don your cool hat, bring your whip and join
us in two weeks. Thank you very much for listening.
(54:05):
If you like this podcast, please do us a huge
favor subscribe in your favorite podcast up. We really appreciate it,
even you just thinking about doing that. Thank you, and
don't forget our absolutely amazing continuing education deal at www
dot Integrative Medicine Council dot org. That's Council c O
U n C I L dot org. Slash c e
(54:27):
U S one CUS one and you can always get
in touch with me at doctor Greg at sperbserbs dot
com that's s p e r B s h e
r b s dot com, or at our website www
dot sperbserbs dot com. Well, thank you very much, and
(54:48):
as usual we have our bibliography. Thank you. The preceeding
was presented by doctor Greg Sperber would like to thank
Janelle for Awler's support and everybody else who contributed to
this program. Kimothy Roger Campbell, m
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