American Ginseng: Weight-Loss Aid?

In the world of herbal remedies and supplements, very few are credited with more different effects and abilities than ginseng. Ginseng, a root, was once available almost exclusively from Asian growers. In recent years, however, American ginseng has become renowned for its potency and greater affordability than its Asian cousin.

Among the benefits attributed to American and Asian ginseng are increased stress resistance, blood sugar stabilization, improvement in circulation, increased mental function, cancer prevention and lowering of blood pressure.

Ginseng has been used for thousands of years in the Far East for various purposes, most famously as an aphrodisiac. It may in fact be that use that has led to the resistance to its use among the traditional medicine community. Lumping ginseng in with such exotic substances as powdered black rhino horn makes it simple to just dismiss out of hand the potential benefits of ginseng use.

However, the situation quickly becomes one of "Where there's smoke, there's fire" when you look at the long history of ginseng use. Consider the snake oil salesmen of the 1800s and early 1900s. They sold spurious curatives, most often made of coal oil mixed with copious amounts of grain alcohol, that were reputed to cure everything from lack of energy to paralysis. It didn't take long for modern medicine to thoroughly discredit these "cures" and banish them to museum shelves.

This has not been the case with American ginseng, though. In spite of scoffing from groups like the American Medical Association, ginseng use continues to increase, and some traditional practitioners are becoming less and less strident in their insistence that their patients eschew all manner of herbal self-treatments.

With any herbal preventative or remedy, the keys are the purity and concentration of the product. Here, a Catch-22 traps the consumer: In order for the government to place regulations on purity and concentration, it would have to admit that the herbs have some therapeutic effect. Since such admission is not forthcoming, American ginseng and other natural remedies continue to be treated as food products. The best course of action is to stick to reputable providers, and be sure to buy the products in stores that do enough business that the stock stays fresh. For this reason, a health-food store is likely your best choice, as bottles on the shelf in a grocery store or big-box store may have been there for quite some time.

You are the best judge of ginseng's effects on you. But just like any medicine, prescription or herbal, a large part of its efficacy is based on your faith in it.

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