One of every three American adults regularly uses herbal supplements, including both St. John's Wort and saw palmetto, the two most popular supplements in use today (Schardt, 6). St. John's Wort, just a few short years ago, was little more than an obscure weed growing wild in North America. Today, as Schardt (60) has commented, St. John's Wort is one of the "most common and popular 'feel-good' herbal supplements." Millions of people take it as a "natural" way of fighting depression. However, as this brief report will demonstrate, despite years of scrutiny and clinical research, there are more questions about the usefulness of this substance than there are answers regarding its efficacy in treating depression or any other condition.
Commonly known as St. John's Wort, Hypericum perfortaum is an herbaceous perennial plant that has long been used in natural medical practice as a treatment for depression and other disorders of mood and affect (Rodriguez and Contreras, 688). Phytotherapy based on H. perforatum extracts is employed commonly in treatment of depression in its mild manifestations around the world; Rodriguez and Contreras (688) noted that through phytochemical analysis, the leaves, stems and flowers of H. perforatum have been found to contain bioactive substances identified as hypericin and hyperforin.
Some anti-depressant-like actions have been identified for H. perforatum in animal studies described by Rodriguez and Contreras (689). H. perforatum seems to have effects similar to clinically effective antidepressant drugs such as fluoxetine, paroxetine, sertraline, imipramine, desipramime, maproptiline, buspirone, mianserine and imprindole. Evidently, H,. perforatum interacts with diverse neurotransmitter and neuroendocrime systems in the organism; this constitutes, according to Rodriguez and Contreras (690), a real challenge in which "it is necessary to determine how each system participates in the pharmacologic...