St Johns Wort: Treating Depression Naturally :: Biology Essays Research Papers

St Johns Wort Treating Depression NaturallyAs the majority of state in this world, I suffer from small-scale belief from time to time. Although this has neer been serious comely to cause any changes in my ability to function, it is enough of an interference in my life to cause me to seek some cast of therapy. Most of the time a good healthy cry or some exercise will take cargon of any mild depression scarcely there are times when more is needed. more people in this sort of situation are reluctant to turn up any sort of personality altering medicate such as Prozac. There is little doubt that these drugs do wonders for people with cases of severe depression but they are a little extreme for the minor depression found in most everyday life. A natural secondary to these synthetic drugs seems greatly appealing to me. Many vitamin and pharmaceutical companies are right off offering such a drug St Johns Wort. This natural mood-enhancer, also cognise as hypericum, is now being displayed all over television, the radio, and the internet. It can be found everywhere in the local health food store, securities industry stores, across the Internet, and in some countries, the doctors office(1) (2). But what is it? Is it really safe? How untold is actually known around the effects of this wonder cure? The answers to these questions are not as easily answered as one might think. Although the Internet is a strong source of information it is very cluttered with ad sites for this drug providing little or no information besides its benefits and praises (3). Also, this drug has not yet been approved by the FDA in the United States and whence is not prescribed. Following FDA approval, more will be known about the drug and its effects. There is little doubt that this drug does wonders for mild depression. In 1996 research in England showed that hypericum not only worked better than the placebo but in many cases worked just as well as the time-tested prescription dr ugs (4). The National Health Institute is currently in the eye of a three- social class research project concerning hypericum that should end in the year 2000. FDA approval should be following shortly thereafter. In Germany, however, hypericum is a licensed drug that is prescribed twice as often as standard antidepressants (1). Almost 200,000 prescriptions are filled every month for Jarsin, a drug containing hypericum (5).