Reishi and multiple myeloma: full study

On July 30th, just before leaving for the U.S., I posted about Reishi, or Ganoderma lucidum, and its murderous effect on leukemic, lymphoma and MM cell lines. At the time, I had been able to read only the abstract.

Soon thereafter, a blog reader (thank you!) kindly let me know that the full study is available online: http://tinyurl.com/ljsbh7. Slight problem: my online copy (I hope this doesn’t happen to everyone!) comes to an abrupt halt at the end of page 7, which means that the final Discussion points are missing, as are the references. Very peculiar. As usual, though, Sherlock (grazieee!) came to the rescue by sending me the complete study, so I was able to fill in the missing bits.

Let’s see. Since the full study (or rather, most of it!) is online, I won’t make but a few comments. Reishi was tested against the above-mentioned cell lines together with other five herbs with known anti-cancer activities (see above link, the Discussion part, page 7) and was found to be the most active of all. It was especially effective against the blood cancer cell lines.

The following excerpt is from page 8, my mysteriously “missing” online page: Taken together, our study is the first to examine the effects of G. lucidum extract on a large panel of hematologic cell lines. Our results show that G. lucidum extract has activity against leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma cells and may be a novel adjunctive therapy for the treatment of hematologic malignancies. Further research is planned to isolate the triterpenoid constituent of G. lucidum (ganoderic acid) and to examine its anti-cancer potential.

I bought a Reishi extract while in the U.S. this summer and plan to test it, on myself of course!, at some point this winter. Interesting times lie ahead…I hope!

5 Comments

  1. I took a high quality Reishi extract for several months in early 2006. I was newly diagnosed and didn’t have the perspective I now have. During that time I was relatively stable, but that wasn’t good enough. My bone marrow involvement was around 75%…

    With a few more years of perspective, in my opinion, I would expect Reishi to be a weak single agent but synergistic in the right combination. Toss it in the cocktail and see if life is better.

    I do wish it wasn’t so expensive.

  2. I would like to know more about the use of medicinal mushrooms for cancer treatment. I hear that it matters how they are prepared and that hot water extraction is the best. Does anyone know for sure how to know what company prepares the mushrooms in keeping with what has been used in the research?

  3. I have a friend who got diagnosed with MM and AMYlodisis. Sorry about the spelling. She had poor prognosis and was alot older than me. She did some chemo and then her doctor put her on high dose reishi mushroom. That was about a year ago. I see her at church every Sunday and she looks good and her numbers are steady. She buys her reishi mushrooms from Asian market. They come dried, sliced, and in a box. There is a certain way you have to prepare it. For example, you have to let it soak for some time and then boil it. Save the juice and then pour more water into the pot and make more. You have to drink about a jars worth per serving. I have it written down somewhere. Feel free to email me if you are interested in doing this. I’ve tried it, it taste very bitter but it is working for my friend. al_rojas@sbcglobal.net

  4. The link above doesn’t work at all.
    Could you please send me the title of the study?
    I’m doing research on Reishi as a traditional cancer treatment.

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