"If repeated in humans, all of these changes would be beneficial for people affected by type 2 diabetes or other metabolic diseases associated with insulin resistance," says lead author Dr Ying Leng, who works in the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Science, Shanghai, China.  Many countries have used herbal medicine much longer than America.  When it comes to the use of Chinese herbs and herbal medicine in fact, in both Germany and Japan, herbs and herbal formulas are only prescribed by doctors.  Hmm, why don't we have this? That's certainly another blog, back to diabetes.  

Sleeping problems can become an additional unwanted side effect of diabetes.  iSleep Herb Pac can help people with diabetes to  get to sleep and stay asleep.   

"Our work showed that this natural extract from Chinese herbs could point the way to a new way of helping people with type 2 diabetes as well as other metabolic disorders." says Dr Leng.  There are already many Chinese herb formulas that improve digestion and can help with over eating.  Hopefully soon we will have a standard herbal formula for insulin maintenance. 

Read more about the study here.

Often, menstrual pain and cramps are not taken seriously. But here at Pac Herbs we take them very seriously, as do a group of researchers at the University of Taipei.  These researchers from Taiwan have made international news.  Using highly specialized brain scanners the researchers found the anatomy of the female brain changed as a result of painful menstrual cramps.  If fact, even if women did not have cramps at the time of the brain scans, yet had experienced moderate to severe cramps on a regular basis for years, scans still showed their brains gray matter had abnormalities.  Yes, abnormalities!  This is the first documented evidence of it's type. This research proves the monthly misery of menstrual cramps have serious lasting side effects, similar to the effects of people who deal with chronic pain issues. This research is published in the Sept. 2010 issue of PAIN.

"A long-term bombardment by peripheral pain can elicit plastic changes in the central brain as a reactive adaptation," Hsieh explained. "It can also be a crucial mechanism that perpetuates the 'chronification' of pain" — that is, a mechanism that can turn pain into a lingering affliction, says  Dr. Jen-Chuen Hsieh, a professor of neuroscience at the Institute of Brain Science at National Yang-Ming University in Taipei, Taiwan, and lead researcher.  Previously, the researches found PET brain scans also showed differences in brain activity.

Menstrual cramps, or pain in the lower abdomen occur when the uterus contracts during menstruation.  Cramps are one of the most common gynecological disorder in women of childbearing age. As a woman who has been through some pretty painful menstrual cramps in my life, I found Chinese herbs can eliminate monthly suffering and I wanted to share it with others. This is the reason I gave birth to PMS Relief Herb Pac.  (Not a traditional birth, but a birthing of sorts.)

Whether you experience the moodiness, cramps, backaches, bloating, breast tenderness or all of the above, PMS Relief will work for you.  It's packed with 14 herbs (a dried powder extraction) which has been used through-out Asia for centuries.  Based on Traditional Chinese Medicine, our herbal blend of Chinese herbs (not Western herbs) is nothing like what's been on the American market before.  One packet mixed in water is all you need to start feeling the immediate relief.   Most women use a packet the day before their cycle starts and then a packet or two on their worst cramping days. Did I mention it's all natural herbs, nothing artificial added and it taste good too.   

Do your brain and your body a favor and give PMS Relief a try.  There is really no reason to suffer any longer. Chinese herbs have the longest continual use history of any medicine on earth. What are you waiting for, an abnormal brain to develop?

Read the abstract here: http://www.painjournalonline.com/article/S0304-3959(10)00329-5/abstract

This remarkable research conducted at Yale University is incredible news for Americans.  Asian societies, on the other hand, have used these Chinese herbs for generations and understand that boiling peony root, with licorice root, red dates and skullcap root can help the gastro-intestinal tract especially when one is suffering from diarrhea.

The recently announced research proved a drug made from four traditional Chinese herbs, dubbed PHY906, countered the side effects of chemo in rats.  The researchers decided to give the mice, who were on a chemotherapy drug which has side effects of nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, this blend of natural herbs.   Not only did the four Chinese herbs improve the mices symptoms of diarrhea but it simultaneously cut the cancerous tumors growth.

 “This combination of chemotherapy and herbs represents a marriage of Western and Eastern approaches,” said lead researcher Dr. Yung-Chi Cheng.

A study such as this and so many others, (see some of our earlier articles) are slowly beginning to open up American minds to the incredible health benefits of Chinese herbs. I found it interesting to listen to the interview with Dr. Cheng. He states that the four herbs must be used in combination and cooked together.  Used individually, they did not perform the same function. He says, "deletion of any of those herbs, you have a different impact on three biological endpoints."  This is exactly what Chinese medicine textbooks have told us for years. It is the combination of herbs cooked together that create the synergy and provide the valuable healing medicinal action.

The use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) has become a core component in  treating cancer patients. Diarrhea is one of the major side effects of the cancer drug irinotecan.  According to  Dr. Yung-Chi Cheng this herbal remedy is based on the formula which was first established 1,800 years ago and is also known as Huang Qin Tang. It was historically used and still is used today for treatment of diarrhea and GI disorder[s].  The popularity of natural herbal medicine has been expanding each year in America as more studies like this are published.

Read more about this study here

or hear an interview with the researchers or podcast translation of the interview here.

If you are ever curious what an herb shop or traditional Chinese herb pharmacy looks like in China, check out Stockton street in San Fran. The picture below is pretty good representation from store to store.   You'll find every strange root, dried fish and plenty of red shiny bottles labeled only in Chinese. This is the traditional medicine of China and that which millions of people rely on daily for their coughs, colds and aches and pains.  The same herbs that have been used continuously for generations.  If you have never purchased Chinese herbs before this may not be the place to start unless you speak the language.  It can be a bit intimidating since pretty much everything is labeled in Chinese. 

One last note on the mega Buddha,“Three Heads Six Arms reflects the changing realities of Chinese people today and also reflects the attitude that humankind has conquered nature and even reflects deeds of volition and hope,” said Zhang, the artist who created the colossal bronze sculpture.  It's definitely worth a drop by if your in the area, as are the Chinese herbal pharmacies.

It all started when the GAO office of the U.S. government  purchased 40 unique single-ingredient herbal supplement products from 40 different manufacturers and submitted them to an accredited laboratory for analysis. The  government survey identified the most commonly used herbs among the elderly as chamomile, echinacea, garlic, ginkgo biloba, ginseng, peppermint, saw palmetto, and St. John’s wort and then purchased these Chinese herb and Western herb products.  As part of their investigation they had the herbs analyzed at independent laboratories.  What's crazy, is not what the test showed about the supplements but that pesticide residue is not considered by the Food and Drug Administration, to be of regulatory significance.  In other words, your herbal supplements can be contaminated with all kinds of pesticides and still be legally sold in the U.S. for health benefits. 

Who's products do you buy? Do your homework and know whether your supplement manufacturer is testing products for dangerous pesticides and heavy metals like arsenic, lead and mercury.  I, like you, want to know my herbs come from the cleanest possible sources and are not contaminated with chemicals before I ingest them. 

A little secret.  Pac Herbs products are some of the most tested herbs in the industry.  Check out our manufacturer KPC for more information on all the testing they perform before raw herbs can be considered for processing.

Link to the full study here.

Another article on herbal manufacturing and transparency of herbal supplement manufacturers.

Tip of the day:  The best treatment for insomnia according to researchers is to change your thought patterns.   Once you change your thoughts your behavior will follow. You see, what you think is what you get.  So it makes sense that insomnia really is, all in the mind. 

 Hint:  If you need a kick start to change your mind set without hitting the heavy prescription sleep aids, try our iSleep Herb Pac.  It contains nine herbs and is based on an ancient Chinese herbal formula called Suan Zao Ren Tang.  Famous minds have used Chinese herbs to help them calm their busy brains and induce a restful night of sleep for centuries. Nothing new under the sun here. Just natural substances found in plants, working together to help reduce stress and calm your head.  It will work for you too, without addiction or side-effects.      

By Jan Yager, Ph.D.
ConsumerAffairs.com

You’ve heard that expression, “I’ll sleep when I’m dead.” Well, it turns out that getting enough sleep, and other kinds of rest, just might postpone when your death occurs as well as increase the effectiveness and joyfulness of your life.

Consider this: the Nurses’ Health Study conducted by Harvard University found that getting too little sleep is linked to a greater risk of getting breast cancer, colon cancer, diabetes, and heart disease.

Furthermore, sleep deprivation causes drowsy driving which can lead to accident fatalities. As reported by the the National Sleep Foundation at their website devoted to drowsy driving, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that 1,500 deaths and 71,000 injuries are caused annually because of falling asleep at the wheel.

In another study, a review of information about 28,000 children and 15,000 adults found that too little sleep doubled the chances of being obese. Obesity has, in turn, been linked to a variety of life-threatening illnesses including sleep apnea, a condition in which we stop breathing during sleep. As pointed out in “Sleep Apnea Tied to Increased Risk of Stroke,” especially for men over the age of 40, having sleep apnea more than doubles their potential for a stoke.

Preventing an early death or decreasing the likelihood you will become obese aren’t the only reasons we need to get enough sleep and rest. We also need it so we can be alert at work, making it less likely that we’ll make mistakes, have accidents, or fall asleep during meetings, which could embarrass you or, worse, get you fired. Also, too little sleep can increase someone’s tendency to fly off the handle or to be overly emotional, reduce memory retention and increase depression. Simply put, too little sleep reduces the overall quality of our lives.