Astragalus herb is used by traditional Chinese doctors to stimulate the immune system. Astragalus root contains various compounds including astragaloside. This plant is native to Northern China and Mongolia. Astragalus herb inhabits mostly pine forests and sandy soils. Chinese doctors have used astragalus herb to fight the common cold and the flu. Very little human research regarding the use of astragalus root extract is available in the western medical literature and further studies in the next few years will make it clearer on how this herbal supplement could be of benefit.

Chemistry of astragalus root
Astragalus root contains polysaccharides that are thought to play an important role in influencing the immune system. Astragalus root also contains saponins called astragalosides, along with flavonoids and triterpenes.

Buy Astragalus extract, 500 mg
Planetary Formulas
Astragalus herb is one of the primary immune tonifiers of Chinese herbs. Full spectrum astragalus combines a standardized astragalus herb extract with whole high grade astragalus root, to ensure the presence of the full spectrum of astragalus constituents.

Astragalus supplement facts:
Amount Per 2 tablets:
Calcium - 64 mg - 6%DV
Astragalus Root Extract - 500 mg* (standardized to 0.4% methoxyisoflavones)
Astragalus Root (high grade) - 500 mg *

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Suggested Use: One or two astragalus tablets a few times a week, or as recommended by your health care professional.
* Astragalus daily value not established.

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Twice a month we Email you a brief abstract of several new studies on various supplements and natural medicine topics and their practical interpretation by Ray Sahelian, M.D. We will mention research updates on Astragalus and natural ways to improve the immune system.
 

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Potential benefits of astragalus herb and extract

Aplastic anemia
Clinical study on effect of Astragalus Injection and its immuno-regulation action in treating chronic aplastic anemia.
Chin J Integr Med. 2007 June. TCM Hospital of Langfang City, Chinese Hemopathic Therapeutic Center of TCM, Hebei, 065000, China.
To observe the clinical effect of astragalus Injection in treating chronic aplastic anemia. Sixty patients with aplastic anemia were randomly assigned to two groups equally, both were treated with Stanozolol three times a day, 2 mg each time through oral intake, but astagalus was given additionally to the patients in the treated group once a day via intravenous dripping. All were treated for 15 days as one therapeutic course and the whole medication lasted for more than 4 months totally, with follow-up adopted. Astragalus injection could promote the recovery of hemopoietic function, which might be through improving T-lymphocyte subsets and reducing the release of negative regulatory factors such as TNF-alpha and IL-2 to alleviate the inhibition on hemopoietic function.

Heart failure
Astragalus has protective effect on ischemia  /reperfusion injury. May be helpful in congestive heart failure.

Study on effect of Astragalus injection in treating congestive heart failure.
Zhou ZL, Yu P.Third People's Hospital, Hangzhou 310009.
To observe the clinical efficacy and side-effects of Astragalus Injection in treating congestive heart failure (CHF). Eighty-three CHF patients with heart function of II-IV grade assessed by New York Heart Association classification were randomly divided into 2 groups. The 42 patients in the treated group were treated with astragalus 40 ml (equivalent to 80 g crude drug) by adding in 5% glucose solution 500 ml for intravenous dripping, once a day and the 41 patients in the control group were treated by nitrolingual injection. The therapeutic course in both groups was 2 weeks and the patients were followed-up for 1- 6 months. The clinical heart function improvement rate and the total effective rate in the astragalus treated group after 1 month treatment were 26% and 78%, and after 6 months were 34% and 81% respectively, which were superior to those in the control group significantly. The levels of left ventricular ejection fraction, fractional shortening of left ventricular short axis, stroke volume, cardiac output  and the cardiac index were all improved in both groups, but better improvement was shown in the astragalus group. Follow-up study showed that the incidence of cardiac event was lower in the astragalus group than that in the control group. Astragalus can be viewed as one of the important auxiliary drugs for treatment of CHF especially in severe cases.

Immune system
Astragalus has been shown to enhance certain aspects of the immune system, and may have some anti-HIV activity in laboratory studies. It's difficult to know at this time whether astragalus would have anti-HIV activity when ingested as a supplement.

Astragalus and kidney disease
Astragalus may be helpful in diabetic nephropathy.

Protective effects of Astragalus saponin I on early stage of diabetic nephropathy in rats.
J Pharmacol Sci. 2004 Jun;95(2):256-66.
Diabetic nephropathy (DN) has become the leading cause of end stage failure, but no renoprotective treatment has been very available for use in DN. Astragalus saponin I, a component extracted from Astragalus membranaceus, was studied in experimental DN induced by administration of streptozotocin in male rats. The early DN rats were treated with 3 doses of astragalus for 8 weeks to analyze its efficacy with different parameters. By comparison with vehicle-treated DN rats, the renal hypertrophy, the oxidative stress intensity, and the blood glucose level of DN rats were ameliorated by astragalus. Also, the microalbuminuria level, advanced glycated end-products either in serum or in kidney cortex, and the aldose reductase activity were significantly reduced. The results suggest that astragalus has therapeutic effects on several pharmacological targets in the progress of DN and is a potential drug for prevention of early stage DN.

Oral herpes
In a test tube study, astragalus was found to inhibit oral herpes virus. Whether the same effect will occur in humans is is not yet clear.

Experimental study of the effect of Astragalus membranaceus against herpes simplex virus type 1
Di Yi Jun Yi Da Xue Xue Bao. 2004 Jan;24(1):57-8.
To study the inhibitory effects of Astragalus membranaceus on herpes simplex virus type 1(HSV-1). In the 2BS cells infected with HSV-1, the antiviral effect of Astragalus membranaceus decoction was investigated by observing the inhibition of HSV-1-induced cytopathic effect in response to treatment with the decoction. The half inhibition concentration (IC50) and minimal inhibition concentration of Astragalus membranaceus were 0.98 and 1.95 g/ml respectively, with the therapeutic index of 128. Astragalus membranaceus has obvious HSV-1-inhibiting efficacy and low cytotoxicity.

Astragalus research update
Astragalus membranaceus reduces free radical-mediated injury to renal tubules in rabbits receiving high-energy shock waves.
Chin Med J (Engl). 2005 Jan;118(1):43-9.
Recent studies have revealed the important role of free radicals in renal damage induced by high-energy shock waves (HESW). This study aimed at investigating the effects of Astragalus membranaceus, a traditional Chinese medicinal herb, on free radical-mediated HESW-induced damage to renal tubules in a live rabbit model. This study provides preliminary evidence indicating that Astragalus membranaceus has strong protective effects on free radical-mediated renal tubular damage induced by HESW and that these effects are superior to the effects of verapamil.

Traditional Chinese medicine Astragalus reverses predominance of Th2 cytokines and their up-stream transcript factors in lung cancer patients.
Oncol Rep. 2003 Sep-Oct;10(5):1507-12.
Th2 cytokine is predominant in tumor patients and was found to be associated with tumor progression. Reversing of Th2 dominant status is thought to be a promising strategy. In the present study, peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMNC) of 37 lung cancer patients and 19 healthy subjects were prepared and used for examination of cytokine secretion and gene expression. Astragalus was observed to reverse Th2 status of lung cancer. Astragalus enhanced culture supernatant and gene expression levels of Th1 cytokine and its transcript factor (T-bet), and reduced those of Th2 cytokines in cultured PBMNC of lung cancer patients. These results demonstrated that traditional Chinese medicine Astragalus might reverse the Th2 predominant status in lung cancer patients, which is a probable alternative therapeutic regime in future.  

Effect of astragalus on the endothelin in rats with acute lung injury.
J Tongji Med Univ. 1999;19(3):206-8, 214.
The effect of astragalus on the endothelin in serum and lung of the rats with acute lung injury was studied. The results demonstrated that the concentration of endothelin in the lung of the rats in therapy group was lower than that of the injured rats and level of serum endothelin was also lower than that of the injured rats. PaO2, serum SOD, lung coefficient, ratio of lung wet weight/dry weight in two groups were also significantly different respectively, and the lung pathological injury in the treatment group were less than that of injury group. So it is concluded that astragalus could inhibit the increase of serum and lung endothelin, thereby playing a protective role in the rats with acute lung injury.

Astragalus herb questions and emails
Q. i have found that astragalus root does help with genital herpes. i have been taking this for years now and i have not had an outbreak since. it does what your supposed to do to keep yourself healthy and stress free, it also keeps my immune system up, and that helps over all really, along with my diet. i had to change how i ate everyday day to day and well for the rest of my life. but i would surly say that my doctor and i have talked this over and she even said that it was a good thing for me to start taking. i was the one who told her about astragalus root and she agrees with my decision to take it. i just thought i'd let you know my story.

Q. I read with interest your page on astragalus. I have known its positive effect on the immune system, and I am taking it to boost my immune system thinking that it will, therefore, aid the healing process in my eye, which has a herpes viral infection and for which I am using Vyroptic eye drops. Do you think I have made a wise decision?
   A. We can't comment on specific treatment decisions, that it the role of your doctor. There is not much information on astragalus or other herbs and their role in herpes viral infections, particular of the eyes. Therefore, it is difficult to make any predictions on the role of astragalus herb use and whether it would provide any benefit.

Raw material suppliers have
Astragalus P.E. 0.2% Flavone /16% Polysacchrides
Astragalus Root 16% Polysacchrides (UV-VIS)

This astragalus root page was last updated February 2008.