***Ginseng ?***

[RhondaH]

A coworker has been having headaches (not breast cancer related) and was wondering how long it takes for Ginseng to leave the body (she drinks diet Pepsi max) which has panac ginsenc extract in it and thought maybe this may be causing it. I told her I am not much into supplements, but would ask you. Thank you. Take care and God bless.

Rhonda

[R.B.]

Thank you for posting that. I did a quick WEB search. I was not aware that ginseng could be the cause of headaches, or increased coagulation factors. (see links)

Of more interest for this forum are the possible oestrogenic effects.

Good or bad is beyond me. There is a suggestion that it stimulates receptors and another that it blocks blood vessel growth, and a third that it has oestrogenic effect.

Maybe somebody has some thoughts.

RB




http://www.wright.edu/admin/fredwhite/pharmacy/popular_nremedies3.html

"People who take Ginseng and have estrogen-dependent malignancies (breast cancer) may need to avoid taking Ginseng, as it could increase growth rates of cancerous cells. There are two significant drug interactions with Ginseng. Ginseng can affect platelet adhesiveness and blood coagulation."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=PubMed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=15240639&ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVAbstractPlus

Ginsenoside-Rb1 from Panax ginseng C.A. Meyer activates estrogen receptor-alpha and -beta, independent of ligand binding.
Cho J, Park W, Lee S, Ahn W, Lee Y.

College of Life Science, Institute of Biotechnology, Department of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Sejong University, Kwang-Jin-Gu, Seoul 143-747, Korea.

"Treatment with 17beta-estradiol or ginsenoside-Rb1 increased expression of the progesterone receptor, pS2, and estrogen receptor in MCF-7 cells and of AP-1-driven luciferase genes in COS cells. Although these data suggest that it is functionally very similar to 17beta-estradiol, ginsenoside-Rb1 failed to displace specific binding of [(3)H]17beta-estradiol from estrogen receptors in MCF-7 whole-cell ligand binding assays. Our results indicate that the estrogen-like activity of ginsenoside-Rb1 is independent of direct estrogen receptor association."



http://www.nature.com/bjp/journal/v152/n2/full/0707360a.html

A ginseng-derived oestrogen receptor bold italic beta (ERbold italic beta) agonist, Rb1 ginsenoside, attenuates capillary morphogenesis

A Papapetropoulos Laboratory of Molecular Pharmacology, Department of Pharmacy, University of Patras, Patras, Greece

Correspondence: Dr A Papapetropoulos, Laboratory of Molecular Pharmacology, Department of Pharmacy, University of Patras, Patras 26504, Greece. E-mail: apapapet@upatras.gr

Received 23 March 2007; Accepted 14 May 2007; Published online 2 July 2007.

"Ginseng extracts contain a variety of active ingredients and have been shown to promote or inhibit angiogenesis, depending on the presence of different ginsenosides that exert opposing effects on blood vessel growth. Leung et al. in this issue of the British Journal of Pharmacology report that Rb1, a ginsenoside that constitutes only 0.37–0.5% of ginseng extracts (depending on manufacturing and processing methods), blocks tube-like network formation by endothelial cells in vitro. At the molecular level, Rb1 binds to the oestrogen receptors and stimulates the transcription of pigment epithelium-derived factor that, in turn, inhibits matrix-driven capillary morphogenesis."


http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1714565



http://nccam.nih.gov/health/asianginseng/