• Il Hwa Health News August 2007 •

Il Hwa Health News August 2007

Monday, August 06, 2007

Effects of Ginseng on Diabetes Mellitus

Many people throughout the world suffer from diabetes which ranks third as the cause of death in the United States. Diabetes is a complex disease characterized by an elevated level of glucose in the blood and in the urine, glucose being excreted in the urine when the reabsorptive capacity of the kidney reaches its upper limit. Diabetic symptoms include excessive thirst and frequent urination because the excreted glucose accompanies water, thus the term diabetes mellitus means excessive excretion of sweet urine. Although the underlying causes are not yet clear, it is evident that a deficient production of the hormone secreted by the pancreatic b-cells, insulin, impairs glucose metabolism. The loss of glucose due to excessive excretion leads to a breakdown of lipids and proteins causing further complications which may lead to coma and death in acute cases.
The effects of Korean ginseng described in early Chinese medicinal texts include “quenching one’s thirst.” Probably the ailment associated with thirst must be the diabetes of today. The administration of ginseng to diabetic patients at the early stage of diabetic conditions returned to normal, and in case of patients in advanced stages, the blood glucose level was significantly lowered (Y. Yoshita et al., J.S. Jo and S.H. Park, H. Okuda et al.). When the patients were treated with both insulin and ginseng, the combined effects were certainly beneficial - insulin requirements were reduced, still effectively lowering the blood sugar level. Treating diabetic patients with ginseng does not only lower the blood glucose level. Ginseng appears to normalize the whole physiological system. Thus, subjective symptoms such as fatigue and decreased sexual desire were also alleviated. Active ginseng components which exhibit insulin-like effects include ginsenosides Rb2 and Re and mangan-containing compounds. In diabetic rats (streptozotocin-induced), the administration of ginsenosides Rb2 significantly lowered the blood glucose level and reduced the accumulation of serum triglyceride. Ginsenosides Rb2 also improved the nitrogen balance including both blood urea and hepatic urea nitrogen elevated due to diabetic conditions (M. Kimura et al., T. Ando et al., T. Yokozawa.).
Insulin as well as a good diet regimen supplemented with ginseng should help manage diabetes.

Staying Healthy

By: Florence Lee

Staying healthy is one of the utmost concerns of today’s busy population. In order to stay healthy, we exercise, we eat healthy food, and we go on diets. We all hope to stay healthy and maintain a productive life for as long as we are able. Why not.
Our body system is the most intricate system in the world. Furthermore, the most fascinating fact of all is that each one of us is the manager of this incredibly intricate physiological system. Our physiological system consists of such well-designed organs as the liver, kidneys, heart, lungs, and spleen which work concurrently with hormones, enzymes, neuro-networks, and more. Not a single unit is able to function independently since they are all interconnected. When one part becomes damaged, the effect is felt throughout the system, just as little cut on your finger disturbs your sleep and keeps you awake at night.
The physiological system is designed to function properly when the whole system is well-balanced, that is, when the homeostasis of the body system is maintained. What we call “vitality” is this well-balanced state of the system. Through dynamic equilibrium, the entire body system maintains an integrated system operating at optimum condition. A supply of nutrients and energy ensures the dynamic equilibrium which constantly “generates” and “breaks down” - the continuous processes of biogenesis and bioneogenesis. Once the system loses its dynamic equilibrium, a large number of physiological functions suffer, and the body falls into a diseased state.
In the past several decades with the increased development of synthetic drugs, Western medicine has mainly focused on curative medicine rather than preventive medicine. Curative medicines such as antibiotics and steroids treat thousands of diseases. Tuberculosis, leprosy, diphtheria, typhus, and small pox no longer threaten our society. Infant mortality rates have been significantly lowered, the average life span in major industrialized nations throughout the East and West is now over seventy years. Scientists are now mapping chromosomes and can identify the defective genes responsible for many hereditary diseases. The Nobel laureate James Watson once said, “I see an extraordinary potential for human betterment ahead of us. The time to act is now.” Even today, Watson’s words hold true. However, today’s medical sciences may be approaching their limit. An increasingly large number of people are suffering from such chronic diseases as cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disorders, arthritis; to mention just a few. We cannot solely rely on drugs and operations. Even worse are the skyrocketing health care expenses which we must pay for the benefits of modern medical care. We have already started practicing preventive medicine - eating, exercising regularly. We must prevent ourselves from falling into a diseased state which may require curative medicines.
In earlier times, preventive medicine was practiced in Europe along with herbal medicines. However, extracting the active components from plants led to the development of synthetic drugs in the early 19th century, and herbal drugs in their original forms have since faded out of American Drug stores. Synthetic drugs gained popularity. Chinese wisdom, however, has kept the knowledge of herbal medicine throughout the centuries since the time of Shen Nung (ca. 3500 B.C.). Why are herbal medicines mild and safe as opposed to synthetic drugs which are strong and toxic oftentimes? There is a great difference between the way active components of plants work in their purified forms and the way active components work in their crude forms in concert with non-active components. Non-active components which we may think unnecessary seem to play a role in safeguarding against side effects and a possible overdose of the active components.
Lao Tzu’s Taoism that formulates the principles of Chinese medicine emphasizes that health is maintained by properly balancing internal forces. An energy imbalance, whether caused by an excess or deficiency within the system, that is, within the internal organs, causes illness. Inner strength, Chi, the vitality, the essence of life, is maintained through dynamic equilibrium within the system. The availability of Chi determines the body’s resistance to stress, both physical and chemical in nature. When energy is exhausted and the dynamic equilibrium is upset, the complex physiological system is no longer able to cope with the changes. The integrity of the system is insulted and faces problems of a diseased state. Chinese medicine treats the sick first by restoring the patient’s inner strength, Chi, and then treating the disease. Western drugs cure certain diseases without the knowledge of the underlying cause of the disease.
Chinese medicinal prescriptions always consist of several herbs. Some of the herbs used in Chinese medicinal prescriptions are familiar to us. There are hundreds more, however, which are unfamiliar. Herbs used in resorting vitality are considered to be kingly medicines. Of the kingly herbs used in prescriptions, ginseng is the most highly valued one. From the time of Shen Nung, ginseng has been known as the king of herbs, the elixir of life. Ginseng appears to help maintain physiological balance and dynamic equilibrium, restoring vitality, the essence of life, when needed. This explains why many people risked their lives hunting for wild ginseng in deep forests, often encountering wild animals and why there are many legendary stories about ginseng.
The secret of staying healthy depends on our willingness to maintain vitality, Chi, within our physiological systems. It may sound quite strange to say that we all need stress in our life. Without stress, however, life would be dull and unexciting. Stress adds flavor, challenge, and opportunity to life. Fortunately, our body system has the potential to cope with a vast number of internal and external stresses. One may simply nurture the potential by taking ginseng and stay healthy.

Severe Pollution in Manila

According to report in Manila’s daily’s, we are breathing polluted air 300% above the acceptable level.
In recent years, due to problems arising from industrial wastes, cases of heavy metal poisoning have often been heard over the news and have led many ginseng research scientists to examine the effects of ginseng on the detoxification of ingested heavy metals. Some experimental results revealed that ginseng treatment increased the excretion of lead and mercury, thus reducing the accumulation of the metals in the system.
Another animal experiment revealed that ginseng exhibited beneficial effects on the detoxification of a carcinogenic compound, benzopyrene. Benzopyrene is a product of the incomplete combustion of gasoline and is also present in cigarette smoke as well as in charred food. Active intermediate metabolites or benzopyrene may bind with a genetic inforamtion carrier, DNA, and cause mutation which may develop cancer. In rats treated with ginseng, a selective induction of enzymes responsible for the detoxification of benzopyrene was observed, and thus the detoxification of benzopyrene was greater in ginseng-fed animals than that in control animals untreated with ginseng.