Customer Reviews

Hypericum (St. John's Wort) and Depression

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Plenty of practical and useful information here and well documented with summaries of past research. I learned quite a bit about dosage, brands, and the most recent theories about how St. John's Wort works. This herb appears to work on three neurochemicals: dopamine, norephedrine, and serotonin. Prozac and other antidepressents don't work on dopamine. Many people with attention deficit disorder are low in dopamine as well as serotonin, so I found this interesting and have added some info to my website on that topic. There's also a website for free updates. I just checked it and there's a reprint of the LA Times article in which some manufacturer's of the herb were found skimping on the product, including Sundown. I liked the technical information; as a scientist I appreciate the opportunity to look at the data myself.

I wanted to know the correct dosages to try and what was safe when taking other medications. This book answered those questions for me. Highly reccomend for anyone suffering from clinical depression.

With the high press this flower has received, another aspect to consider with St. John's Wort is the type of processing and extracting it has undergone. This is barely touched on in this book. For many this product has done the job in knocking down their depression, yet the consumer musy not order from just any herbal site. A supplier must be able to document that his/her product is one that really will be absorbed by the body and be carried to the brain. One on-line site where I personally have had both good service and accurate informaton and product representation is iHerb. They offer only the best products that have undergone sufficient testing. Check them out and good luck if St. John's Wort is what you're choosing.

Trying to struggle through this Newsweek article masquerading as a book is an incredibly frustrating experience. Instead of giving a clear sense of the issues at hand, it just drowns the reader in technical nonsense. I picked it up hoping to get a real sense of the comparative advantages of St. John's Wort vs. Prozac, but was left with no new understanding at all; just a true sense of how much useless information you can pile into a book without providing any insight whatsoever.