Does Saw Palmetto Provide Relief for Enlarged Prostate? Scienists Say No.

Sep 28th, 2011 | By | Category: Featured, Impotence News

Saw Palmetto and BPHThe journal of the American Medical Association released a study yesterday about saw palmetto that brings to question its benefits in relieving incontinence and difficulty with urinating and could find no measurable benefit of saw palmetto.

The study worked like this: 369 men aged 45 years and older (61 years average) were given a one day’s dose worth of saw palmetto or a placebo sugar pill that looked identical. Over the course of 17 months, the men taking the saw palmetto had an increased dosage of 320mg the first 24 weeks, 640mg the second 24 weeks, and 960mg the final 24 weeks.

At the very end of the study, the men on the extract reported an average drop in their American Urological Assn. Symptom Index (AUASI) of 2.2 points; those on the placebo? 2.99 points. On a percentage basis, 1.8% more men on the placebo saw signs of benefit.

The benefits of Saw Palmetto have been touted since ancient times as both a nutritious food and to treat urinary and reproductive problems. In the 19th century, it was believed to treat respiratory conditions like whooping cough and tubercular laryngitis. And in modern times, it is used as alternative medicine to improve urinary condition in older men with benign prostatic hyperplasia (enlarged prostate). Over two million men in the United States, and millions more in Europe, take the supplement daily to relieve a swollen prostate, and the US market alone is worth $125 million.

In 2006, a study found the supplement ineffective to reduce BPH, but its effects on urinary incontinence were still in question. Until now, the most recent study in 2009 suggested that Saw Palmetto provides mild to moderate improvement in urinary treatment, but those claims have also been brought into question again with this latest study.

Sources: BloombergLA Times

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