Ephedra Dangers

Reports Continue to Show Ephedra Dangers

April 19, 2003
A year and a half ago, South Dakota State investigated the claims that ephedra caused weight reduction by elevating resting metabolic rate. By using eight (four women and four men) healthy, normal weight college students, the participants were given an ephedra supplement that contained 20mgs of ephedra alkaloids and 150 mgs of caffeine (amounting to about two strong cups of coffee). Within three hours of being given the ephedra supplements, the resting metabolic rate did rise, but not high enough to allow a person to quickly lose weight but it did raise the systolic blood pressure by 10%.

This ephedra finding was especially worrisome considering ephedra was recommended for exercise use. Exercising without the use of ephedra-containing supplements raises the blood pressure, so the combination of ephedra and exercise appeared to be very dangerous. Due to the worrisome ephedra results, the South Dakota State ephedra experiment was repeated, except the ephedra-caffeine product was given to the ten men and women an hour before exercise and while the results showed blood pressure did not drastically increase, the heart rates did greatly elevate at a 15-17% rise.

Even an hour after exercise, the use of ephedra continued to keep heart rates at a high elevation. When heart rate increases occur, body temperature can also be driven up, a problem seen amongst ephedra-using athletes. Studies continue to confirm the dangers of ephedra, the highly controversial diet supplement linked to death, stroke, heart attack, seizures, and other permanent nerve damages and adverse effects.

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