The best anti-aging herbs

Enlarge Image Image Gallery Herbs can be some of your best allies for minimizing the health risks that come with age. Here are some expert suggestions for strengthening and healing major body systems.

You’ve gotten over the shock of your fortieth birthday—-maybe way over it. You’ve come to accept changes in your mind and body. Your skin is wrinkling, that spare tire won’t go away, you forget the occasional name. The circles under your eyes are getting darker, your hair grayer. Sound familiar?

Aging involves our whole being—it’s a biological, physical, psychological, and cultural process. According to some inherent genetic code, our cellular processes have started to decline. Our immune system has become less efficient. The connective tissue in our skin produces more collagen than elastin, so the tissue is less pliable. Free radicals are taking their toll on various cell and organ systems. Whatever is happening, it happens to the best of us.

Although the legendary fountain of youth doesn’t exist, the search for improved longevity—living better lives longer—is far from a hopeless task. In fact, it can be a highly rational process, one that involves identifying risks associated with aging and minimizing or treating those risks. Herbs can be some of our best allies in this process. They help improve, strengthen, and heal major body systems as we age. On the following pages you’ll find our picks for the best-researched and most useful herbs for living longer and healthier lives.

The mind

As we age, several factors can result in less blood flow to the brain. Blood vessels can lose elasticity and tone, making circulation less efficient in both the arteries and capillaries. Free radicals can lead to tissue oxidation (think of it as mental rust). This, in turn, can contribute to declines in memory function. The brain and central nervous system are especially sensitive to free radical damage.

Blood also can become “sticky,” slowing its flow. Any blockage can cause a stroke. Blood platelets can also clump, reducing flow to the central nervous system and inducing inflammation that can damage nerve cells and other tissue. All these factors, working alone or together, can decrease blood flow to the brain, decrease oxygen utilization, and eventually lead to age-related memory conditions.

Ginkgo
(Ginkgo biloba)

Ginkgo can ease these problems, helping ­reduce the risk of strokes, repair damaged nervous tissue, and increase mental acuity.

Ginkgo leaf extract combines the best of traditional herbal wisdom with rigorous modern science. The benefits of ginkgo leaf extract are now supported by more than 400 scientific studies.

Ginkgo is not only the best-selling phytomedicine in Germany and France, it’s also in the top five of all medications, natural or synthetic, prescribed in Germany. In the United States, it’s best known for its ability to improve short-term memory.