Standardised Extracts - Are They Better?
Many herbal products are now available in so called standardised strengths. This simply means that one or more constituents of the plant are at guaranteed levels in that particular product. This assumes a number of things; firstly that we know what the active constituents of a plant are, and secondly, that having more of a particular active constituent present is automatically a good thing.Herbs in their natural state are not like synthetically produced pharmaceutical drugs of which one can give exact details of amounts of active constituents. The levels of active constituents in a plant will be determined by the quality of the soil, the climate, the altitude that the plant grew in and the way in which the plant was harvested, processed and stored. Many people use this as a reason to criticise herbal medicine saying that it is such an inexact practice as to be worthless, and this argument has increased the popularity of standardised extracts.
However, many herbalists do not advocate the use of standardised products. Some of the reasons for this are outlined below.
- Firstly, any problems that have occurred with herbal products have tended to be with standardised preparations, in which one supposedly active constituent has been increased and set at guaranteed levels. St. John's wort is a point in case. Some parties promoted the notion that it was one constituent of St John's wort in particular, hypericin, that was responsible for the anti-depressant action of the herb, so products with a standardised hypericin content were developed. It was later realised that hypericin was only accountable for a small part of the action of St John's wort and that other constituents were also important. It was also thought that the higher level of hypericin within these products may have been responsible for some of the adverse herb/drug interactions reported.
- A more recent example has been kava kava, a herb which has been temporarily withdrawn from sale due to reported concerns over hepatotoxicity in Germany and Switzerland. In each case, it was a standardised preparation of the kava lactones that were being taken. We still do not know whether these products were at all responsible for the liver problems reported, but the traditional way of taking kava kava, as exemplified by the indiginous people of the South Sea Islands for thousands of years to no apparent harm, has most certainly not involved making preparations with increased levels of one constituent.
- In some cases, we do not even know what the active constituents of a herb are. An example of this is hawthorn - it appears that many constituents are required for the overall cardiovascular effects of this plant and attempts to isolate one particular active constituent fail. Many herbalists believe strongly in using plants in their whole, traditional form, just as eating foods as little processed as possible is usually much more beneficial. Once we start to tamper with the herb we are on the path of turning it into a pharmaceutical drug, and some would argue we are no longer practising traditional herbal medicine. In fairness, we may sometimes increase the effectiveness of one particular action of the herb by doing this, but we risk reducing aspects of the plant that are also crucial or may even balance out potentially harmful aspects of the standardised constituent. A good example of this is the herb meadowsweet. It contains salicylates like many other herbs. These substances can be made into aspirin - a very useful drug but with some drawbacks. It has a tendency to cause stomach bleeds and gastritis, and many people find they cannot take this drug at all as it upsets their digestion too much. Meadowsweet is used as an anti-inflammatory remedy like aspirin (the effect is nowhere near as immediate or strong but it is still a useful arthritis remedy), but due to the other constituents present in it, such as tannins and mucilage, it is actually one of our most valuable stomach and digestive remedies, taken specifically for gastritis and indigestion.
- Another aspect of standardised extracts is that it gives the impression that herbs in their natural state are not useful, and that we must buy complex preparations, usually at greater price. Anyone can grow their own herbs for culinary, medicinal and cosmetic purposes, and not only will they enjoy the benefits of fresh plants, but the act of growing them and becoming familiar with them will bring their own benefits too.
Many herbalists and producers of herbal medicines feel that the way forward is not in standardised products, but in quality control methods that ensure that certain standards of growing, harvesting, storing and processing herbs are followed and guaranteed. One wouldn't dream of making an apple product standardised for pectin or vitamin C content (and nutritional therapists are well aware that there are nutrients present in foods that we have not yet identified and therefore would be left out of a processed product). Most people would probably want a fresh, organic apple, grown and marketed in a way that respected the environment and did not exploit the farmer who grew it. And we certainly don’t want a future where our landscape is dominated by regimented rows of genetically modified herbs, grown to ensure higher levels of certain constituents.
There are always bound to be small differences in levels of constituents/nutrients of naturally cultivated or wildcrafted plants, but then that is the beauty and wisdom of nature.
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