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Ginkgo Biloba: Enhance Your Circulation |
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Ginkgo Biloba:
Enhance Your Circulation
by Hyla Cass, M.D.
Ginkgo (Ginkgo biloba) is a herbal remedy for
memory enhancement that has been used in
the East for thousands of years. Coming from one
of the oldest known species of trees, the first
medicinal uses of ginkgo can be traced back to
2800 B.C. Research has shown that ginkgo
improves short-term and age-related memory
loss, slow thinking, depression, circulation and
poor blood flow to the brain. It has also been seen
to significantly improve both Parkinson’s and
Alzheimer’s diseases over the course of a year.
Ginkgo’s remarkable healing properties appear
to come from two constituent chemicals—
flavonoids and terpene lactones.
As well as being a powerful antioxidant that
helps vitamin E and other antioxidant nutrients
protect the brain from damage, ginkgo also aids
in the production of neurotransmitters and helps
to normalize acetylcholine receptors. However,
its major benefit is its ability to improve the circulation
of blood within the brain by mildly
dilating blood vessels and inhibiting the action of
platelet-activating factor, a substance that
thickens the blood. So, ultimately, ginkgo helps
to get oxygen and other important nutrients into
the brain.
A review of 40 studies testing ginkgo’s effects
on people with cerebral circulation problems, carried
out by Jos Kleijnen and Paul Knipschild from
the University of Limburg in the Netherlands,
found significant improvement in memory, concentration,
energy and mood. After isolating the
eight trials that met the highest methodological
standards, they found that 70 percent of those
receiving ginkgo (120–160 mg daily for 12 weeks)
showed improvement, compared with 14 percent
of those receiving a placebo.
A comprehensive double-blind placebocontrolled
trial involving 309 Alzheimer’s disease
outpatients, ages 60 to 80, was published by
P. L. Le Bars and colleagues in the prestigious
Journal of the American Medical Association. In the
212 subjects who completed the year-long study,
there was significant improvement in cognition
and social performance. TH
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