Maca Increases Libido
Historical or traditional use (may or may not be supported by scientific studies) Maca root has been an important food for the native people in the Andes of Peru, including the Incas, for at least 2,000 years. It is eaten baked, dried, mixed with milk, or in a variety of other forms and dishes. It is also traditionally believed to enhance strength, endurance, libido, and fertility.
Active constituents: Maca contains substantial quantities of protein, fat, fiber, and minerals including iron, which also contribute to its nutritional value. It also contains glucosinolates, the strong-smelling compounds that are responsible for the pungent smell and taste of mustard family plants. Neither these nor any other constituents in maca have definitively been shown to contribute to its actions.
Preliminary studies have shown that maca can increase libido in healthy men. It does this without influencing levels of testosterone or any other sex hormones. Healthy men who take maca have also been shown to have increased semen volume, increased sperm counts, and enhanced sperm motility.
Numerous animal studies show that maca extracts can increase sex drive and improve fertility. Other studies support that it can relieve the negative effects of stress reactions. The red cultivar, though not the black or cream, also reduced enlarged prostates in rats.
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Herbal Sex Boosters
Woody Allen’s late 1970s film Love and Death was eerily prophetic, if in name alone, about the Viagra dilemma. The drug enables many men to achieve an erection and regain lost sexual function, but it can also exact a stiff penalty from users. The Food and Drug Administration has reported dozens of deaths among Viagra users. This seems an unnecessarily severe side effect. Concerns about the drug have spurred interest in effective, natural aphrodisiacs without deleterious side effects. Responding to this interest, I set off for the Amazon rain forest in search of sex-enhancing plants. I traveled in the company of a Brazilian shaman named Bernie Peixoto, a man skilled in tribal wisdom and the use of plant medicines. There in the world’s greatest jungle, we encountered two potent sex-boosting plants with a long history of safe use.
Our flight into Brazil put us into the Amazon city of Manaus, where we met with Antonio Matas, the most highly respected herbalist in that area. Antonio shared stories with us about his decades of healing work using rain-forest plants.
Catuaba and Muirapuama: Sex Enhancers?
“What about catuaba and muirapuama?” I inquired. “Are they really effective sex enhancers, or is that just a myth?” He laughed at the question and spread his hands wide open. “There is nothing that compares with catuaba and muirapuama together. I can tell you, I have used these plants with hundreds of people. The old become sexually young again. I have seen impotent men who can have sex for the first time in years. Even healthy couples find that these plants put extra fire in their sex life. These plants are good for men and women.”
I asked Antonio if he used these plants himself. He smiled again. “Sometimes. After all, I’ve been married to the same woman for 43 years.”
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TweetThe Prostate Basics
Basic Facts about the Prostate Gland: The prostate is a sex gland in males. It is around the size of a walnut, and encircles the neck of the bladder and urethra, the tube that expels urine from the bladder. It is partly glandular and partly muscular, with ducts opening into the prostatic portion of the urethra. The prostate is made up of three lobes: a centrally located lobe with one lobe on each side. The prostate gland secretes a slightly alkaline fluid that forms part of the seminal fluid, a fluid that carries sperm during ejaculation.
There are several benign prostate problems that develop in men. Types of non-cancerous prostate problems, or clinical conditions of the prostate gland that are not cancer, including infections, inflammations, benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) – an enlarged prostate These problems are quite common and may happen to men of all ages. Specific Non-Cancerous Prostate Problems include prostatism – this term describes any condition of the prostate that causes interference with the flow of urine from the bladder. Prostatitis – an inflamed condition of the prostate gland. It can be accompanied by pain, discomfort, frequent or infrequent urination, and sometimes a low-grade fever. Prostatalgia – a term that indicates pain in the prostate gland. Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH)- the condition of an enlarged prostate. BPH is the main non-cancerous prostate problem. It can cause discomfort and create problems urinating. Although it is not cancer, BPH symptoms are very similar to those of prostate cancer. These include impotence, or the inability to have or keep an erection, and urinary incontinence, or the loss of bladder control.
The fear of having prostate cancer can be devastating to most men. Prostate cancer is most successfully treated when discovered early. Consider these statistics supplied from the American Cancer Society: Nearly 80 percent of all prostate cancers is discovered while they are still localized, or confined to the prostate. The five-year survival rate for men diagnosed with prostate tumors that are discovered at this early stage is a whopping 100 percent. Testing works!
In the past 20 years, the survival rate for all stages of prostate cancer has risen due to early detection and treatment. Early prostate cancer often doesn’t present any symptoms and can only be found with regular prostate examinations by your doctor. These tests can help detect, or rule out, prostate cancer. Check back with your physician if you have had an unusual DRE (digital rectal exam), or if your PSA (prostate-specific antigen) level is high. Your physician may order additional tests or suggest repeating the PSA tests if warranted.
For more information visit Prostacet – prostate health supplement.
TweetCertain Omega-3s May Reduce Prostate Cancer Risk
BETHESDA, Md.–Men with high intakes of the omega-3 fatty acids eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) may have a reduced risk of prostate cancer, according to researchers from the National Institutes of Health’s National Cancer Institute (Am J Clin Nutr, 80, 1:204-16, 2004). Increased dietary intake of alpha linolenic acid (ALA), however, may increase the risk of advanced prostate cancer.
Researchers evaluated the association between dietary intake of ALA, EPA, DHA, linoleic acid (LA) and arachidonic acid (AA) and prostate cancer risk in a cohort of 47,866 men between 40 and 75 years of age who were free from prostate cancer at the start of the study. After 14 years of follow-up, 2,965 subjects developed prostate cancer–448 of which developed advanced prostate cancer.
The researchers found men with the highest intake of EPA and DHA combined had an 11-percent reduced risk of developing prostate cancer and a 26-percent reduced risk of developing advanced prostate cancer. Researchers also found while dietary intake of ALA was unrelated to the total risk of prostate cancer, its consumption significantly increased the risk of developing advanced prostate cancer. Specifically, non-animal ALA doubled the risk and ALA from meat and dairy sources increased the risk by approximately 50 percent.
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TweetAntioxidant Levels Key to Prostate Cancer Risk in Some Men
Greater levels of selenium, vitamin E and the tomato carotenoid lycopene have been shown to reduce prostate cancer in one out of every four Caucasian males, or those who inherit a specific genetic variation that is particularly sensitive to oxidative stress, say US researchers.
Conversely, if carriers of this genetic variant have low levels of these vitamins and minerals, their risk of aggressive prostate increases substantially, as great as 10-fold, over those who maintain higher levels of these nutrients, they write in today’s issue of Cancer Research.
“This large prospective study provides further evidence that oxidative stress may be one of the important mechanisms for prostate cancer development and progression, and adequate intake of antioxidants, such as selenium, lycopene and vitamin E, may help prevent prostate cancer,” said Dr Haojie Li, a researcher at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.
The new findings are based on an analysis of 567 men diagnosed with prostate cancer between 1982 and 1995, and 764 cancer-free men from the Physicians Health Study.
The initial goal of this study was to assess the effect of aspirin and beta-carotene on men’s health. Li’s team decided to check for variants of the gene that codes for manganese superoxide dismutatase (MnSOD), an important enzyme that works as an antioxidant in human cells to defend against disease.
The MnSOD gene is passed from parents to offspring in one of three forms: VV, VA or AA.
“Compared with men with the MnSOD VV or VA genotype, people with the AA genotype seem to be more sensitive to the antioxidant status,” said Li. “Men with the AA genotype are more susceptible to prostate cancer if their antioxidant levels are low.”
The study’s results found that a quarter of the men in the study carried the MnSOD AA genotype, half carried the VA genotype, and the remaining quarter carried the VV genotype.
The results indicated that the VA and VV men were at equivalent risk for developing prostate cancer across all levels of antioxidants in their blood.
But compared to MnSOD VV or VA carriers in the lowest quartile of selenium levels, MnSOD AA males had an 89 per cent greater risk for developing aggressive prostate cancer if they had low blood levels of the mineral.
On the other hand, MnSOD AA carriers with high selenium – those men in the highest quartile – had a 65 per cent lower risk than the MnSOD VV or VA males who maintained low levels of selenium.
“The levels of selenium in the highest quartile of these men are not abnormally high,” Li said. “Our range is neither extremely high nor extremely low.”
While similar trends were observed for lycopene and vitamin E when tested independently, the contrast in relative risk was most pronounced for the men who had high blood levels for all three antioxidants combined, said the researchers.
“Among men with the MnSOD AA genotype, we observed a 10-fold difference in risk for aggressive prostate cancer, when comparing men with high versus low levels of antioxidants combined,”said Li. “In contrast, among men with the VV or VA genotype, the prostate cancer risk was only weakly altered by these antioxidant levels.”
“Our study, as well as many other epidemiological studies, encourages dietary intake of nutrients such as lycopene from tomato products, or supplements for vitamin E and selenium to reduce risk of prostate cancer,” said Li.
Prostate cancer is one of the biggest cancer killers in industrial countries and affects more than 500,000 men worldwide every year. This number is expected to increase with the ageing population.
Similar interactions between dietary antioxidants and the variations in the MnSOD gene have previously been linked to risk for breast cancer.
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TweetWhat is a Prostate?
The prostate is a round cluster of glands located at the bottom of the bladder, about midway between the rectum and the base of the penis. The prostate encircles the urethra, the tube that expels urine from the bladder by way of the penis. The ping pong ball sized gland produces most of the fluid in semen. Contraction of the muscles in the prostate squirt fluid from into the urethra tract during ejaculation. This fluid makes up the majority of the ejaculate and transports and nourishes the sperm.
Prostate cancer is the leading cause of cancer related death for American men who don’t smoke. It is primarily a disease of aging. Men in their thirties and forties rarely develop prostate cancer, but the incidence grow steadily after the age of fifty-five. About 80 percent of all prostate cancer cases occur in men over the age of sixty-five. By the age of eighty, 4 out of 5 men have some degree of prostate cancer. Many experts feel that all men will eventually develop prostate cancer if they live long enough. The three most common prostate problems are prostatitis or inflection, prostate enlargement, and prostate cancer.
Medical professionals recommend that men have annual rectal exams as part of a health checkup from ages 40 to 70, and those with high risk and all men 50 and over should add a PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood test every year as well. When prostate cancer is detected early and treated it has a high cure rate. Men are encouraged to discuss the options with their doctor. Based on past screenings doctors have observed that in men ages 50 to 59, the prostate cancer detection rate was basically the same whether men were screened every year or every two years. Therefore normal-risk men in their 50s can to be safely screened every other year. Since there is no cure for advanced prostate cancer, early diagnosis and treatment are essential. Since early prostate cancer normally doesn’t have any symptoms, it is extremely difficult to detect without testing. Screenings using both PSA and DRE tests have proven to be the best and only reliable method of identifying the disease when it can be still be cured easily. Almost fifty-eight percent of all cases are discovered while the cancer is still isolated and at its most treatable stage. A doctor can detect prostate cancer by digital rectal examination and by a PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood test.
For more information visit Prostacet – support your prostate health.
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