Content
One is that it raises your blood alcohol levels faster, which means you may feel intoxicated sooner. Kudzu may also help heavy drinkers cut the amount of alcohol they consume, even if they are not being treated for AUD. Mindfulness therapies have been used to keep people from relapsing.
During the week of puerarin treatment, they drank slightly less than during the placebo week — three drinks a day compared to 3.4. For a final session, they took whichever pill they didn’t take the first time. They took it for a week, then went to the lab again for a drinking session. More remedies are needed to help drinkers who overdo it cut down, Penetar says. The medications approved for treating alcohol abuse and dependence don’t work for everyone, he says. The last study above was designed to test the hypothesis that kudzu accelerates the subjective experience of alcohol intoxication. If this were the primary effect of kudzu increasing blood flow, then subjects should feel more intoxicated with fewer drinks after taking kudzu.
1 Participants
You can eat the root as you would other root vegetables, like potatoes or rutabagas. Kudzu roots can be dried and kudzu for alcohol cravings ground into a powder, which some people use as breading for fried foods or as a thickener for soups and sauces.
In the real treatment, researchers placed needles into zones linked to alcohol-related behaviors. In the sham treatment, they placed needles into other areas of the body. A 2017 research review found that acupuncture helped with alcohol cravings and withdrawal. It also explains why it’s important to find effective treatments. We’re empowering you to make wise decisions about your own health, by providing you with essential health information about both medical and alternative treatment options. Empowering you to make wise decisions about your own health, by providing you with essential health information about both medical and alternative treatment options.
Kudzu: Curbing Alcoholic Urges
On blood pressure, fibrinolysis and oxidative stress in patients with stage 1 hypertension. Protective effect of puerarin against burn-induced heart injury in rats. One study on 82 postmenopausal women notes that using a Pueraria mirifica gel may improve symptoms of vaginal dryness. Another study shows that kudzu flower might be helpful to lessen hot flashes in menopausal women. It is often touted as a means of restoring liver health and protecting against liver damage from too much alcohol. Arno Kroner, DAOM, LAc, is a board-certified acupuncturist, as well as an herbalist and integrative medicine doctor.
Does kudzu root help with hangovers?
Kudzu Root
It has been used in Chinese medicine since at least 200 BC. As early as 600 AD, it was used to treat alcoholism. Today, kudzu is used to reduce symptoms of alcohol hangover, including headache, upset stomach, dizziness, and vomiting.
Franke et al. found that both post- and premenopausal women may begin to produce equol with increased isoflavone exposure. A number of clinical trials in both genders in various disease states have hinted that the ability to produce the human metabolite S-(-)equol from its isoflavone precursor daidzein may hold unique health benefits.
Health is the New Indulgence
Specifically, male and female “heavy” alcohol drinkers were treated with either placebo or a kudzu extract for 7 days and then given an opportunity to drink their preferred brand of beer while in a naturalistic https://ecosoberhouse.com/ environment. They found that Kudzu treatment resulted in significant reduction in the number of beers consumed. Kudzu root gets some serious rep’ for helping folks ease off of the booze.
- Furthermore, Duffy et al. reported using multiple regression analyses, greater bitterness from 3.2 mMPROP was a significant predictor of greater ethanol intensity and less alcohol intake.
- It does NOT include all information about the possible uses, directions, warnings, precautions, interactions, adverse effects, or risks that may apply to this product.
- The form of kudzu they used was root extract, rather than taking portions of the leaves or flowers to consume.
- As Qi is the ‘leader of Blood’, a small amount of Zhi Ke is added to support moving the Blood.
- I recall feeling a very slight prickly feeling in my skin after I’d had a few drinks, and a mild head rush.
Early research focused on rats with good results, which were later replicated with human subjects. Benlhabib E, Baker JI, Keyler DE, Singh AK. Effects of purified puerarin on voluntary alcohol intake and alcohol withdrawal symptoms in P rats receiving free access to water and alcohol. Excessive alcohol consumption is a leading cause of illness worldwide (Shield et al., 2013) and has a significant impact on the health of millions people. The impact of excessive alcohol consumption results in increased healthcare costs, loss of productivity, alcohol-related crime , and motor vehicle accidents. A 2012 study on the kudzu species Pueraria mirifica suggests that doses of 50 to 100 milligrams of kudzu root per day have a low risk of negative side effects. The people who received a dose of kudzu extract drank significantly less beer than they usually did. This is the first ever pilot results showing that the complex Declinol, significantly reduced Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test scores in moderate to heavy drinkers in a naturalistic setting (Figure 1 and 2; Table 3).
Natural Epigenetic-Modifying Molecules in Medical Therapy
True clear yang fills the mind with brightness and intelligence, so when it fails to raise properly, dizziness, fogginess and fatigue ensue, resulting in hangover. A major limitation to this pilot is the small number of subjects evaluated and as such we caution any definitive interpretation of these interesting results. However, this pilot serves as the basis to further these studies and confirmation in a much larger cohort may have important treatment ramifications for not only alcoholism but possibly RDS behaviors as well. The researchers next plan to use Magnetic Resonance Imaging to examine the effects of kudzu on how quickly alcohol gets into the brain. But before Penetar and Lukas—a Professor of Psychiatry at HMS—could endorse kudzu, they needed to be sure that it did not simply make individuals experience the same level of intoxication with half as much alcohol. If that were the case, taking the drug would help people get drunk faster rather than helping them drink less.
There’s not a recommended dosage for kudzu root, but there have been human studies that can help guide you. While the literature seems to support an effect of Kudzu and especially isoflavonoid constituents to suppress ethanol intake in animal models, in contrast, Shebek and Rindone were unable to reproduce this effect in humans. Specifically, in a prospective, randomized, double-blind controlled clinical trial they found no difference between Kudzu and placebo after a one month treatment period in either reducing alcohol craving and or promoting sobriety. Purified puerarin another ingredient in Kudzu root was also shown to suppress alcohol intake in the short term as well reducing withdrawal reactions in high ethanol preferring rats. However this effect does not seem to be due a central brain mechanism . Keung et al. reported that Daidzin is a potent, selective, and reversible inhibitor of human mitochondrial aldehyde dehydrogenase and this natural compound suppresses free-choice ethanol intake by Syrian golden hamsters.