OBAT HERBAL KURANG CESPLENG?..BENARKAH?

REPUBLIKA.CO.ID,JAKARTA--Mendengar kata herbal, apa yang terlintas di benak Anda? Kendati masyarakat telah turun-temurun memanfaatkannya dalam pengobatan, herbal tetap saja lebih inferior ketimbang obat konvensional. Betulkah ia kurang cespleng?

Menjawab pertanyaan tersebut, ahli herbal, Dr dr Amarullah H Siregar FBIHom DIHom DNMed menyodorkan sejumlah argumentasi ilmiah. Belajar naturopati di Inggris dan Amerika, ia mendapati banyak sekali daun, akar, ataupun benalu tumbuhan yang berkhasiat obat. "Di lain sisi, seperti yang diumumkan WHO pada awal 2006 lalu, 1035 obat yang telah disetujui Badan Pengawasan Obat dan Makanan (FDA) Amerika Serikat sepanjang tahun 1989 sampai 2000, tiga perempatnya ternyata tak memiliki makna mengobati."

Di Indonesia, obat dari bahan alami mayoritas masih masuk dalam kelas jamu dan obat herbal terstandar. Baru lima saja yang telah berada di golongan fitofarmaka terbukti memiliki khasiat serupa obat konvensional. "Padahal, hampir semua obat bisa disubstitusi dengan bahan alami," komentar dokter yang mendalami naturopati ini.

Sebut saja, antibiotik. Sesuai namanya, antibiotik berarti antibiota. "Saat dikonsumsi, bakteri baik yang hidup di saluran pencernaan juga ikut terbunuh," ungkap Amarullah dalam Media Discussion Sehat dengan Herbal yang digelar Deltomed, Rabu (19/5) lalu, di Jakarta.

Ini berarti penggunaan antibiotik malah memunculkan masalah kesehatan yang baru. Orang yang mendapatkan antibiotik jangka panjang otomatis membutuhkan suplemen yang dapat menyuburkan kembali populasi bakteri sahabat saluran cerna. "Kalau ditunggu, ia baru bisa mencapai jumlah yang cukup setelah 48 sampai 54 hari kemudian," kata Amarullah yang juga konsultan homeopathic medicine.

Lalu, sekarang, mari simak bagaimana meniran menjalankan perannya sebagai antibiotik alami. Amarullah menuturkan, meniran pintar mengenali sumber masalah. "Hanya bakteri jahat saja yang ditumpasnya."

Namun, sebetulnya, bukan bahan aktif meniran yang berperang secara langsung. Meniran justru mendorong tubuh untuk bisa menyembuhkan diri sendiri. "Meniran mengaktifkan produksi kelenjar timus di paru-paru dan meningkatkan pasokan sel limfosit T yang berkaitan dengan ketangguhan imunitas hingga mampu mematikan bakteri jahat di tubuh," urai dokter naturopati jebolan Clayton College of Natural Health, Birmingham, Amerika Serikat.

Begitu keluhan hilang, konsumsi meniran bisa dihentikan. Tidak seperti antibiotik konvensional yang memang harus diminum sampai habis sesuai jumlah dan dosis yang diresepkan. "Obat herbal andaikan tak dibutuhkan tubuh akan langsung keluar melalui urine, tidak akan menumpuk di dalam tubuh," urai dokter yang memiliki klinik di Ragunan, Jakarta Selatan, ini.

Lebih lanjut, Amarullah mengajak masyarakat agar mengubah paradigmanya. Berobat bukan cuma menghilangkan gejala yang dikeluhkan. "Carilah kesembuhan dengan melacak akar penyakitnya." Amarullah mencontohkan kasus darah tinggi. Tak bijak jika penyakit ini cuma diredakan atau distabilkan dengan obat. "Akar penyakitnya ada di ginjal dan organ itulah yang mesti dikembalikan vitalitasnya."

Persoalannya, spesialis jantung dan kardiovaskular bukan dokter ginjal. Pasien harus ke dokter lain untuk mendapatkan pengobatan. "Sementara itu, dalam naturopati, ilmu kedokteran ini memperlakukan tubuh manusia sebagai satu kesatuan hingga tidak luput merevitalisasi ginjal pasien darah tinggi," kata Amarullah yang dipercaya menyusun kurikulum mata kuliah naturopati di Indonesia.

Obat herbal, lanjut Amarullah, tersedia juga untuk kondisi akut. Contohnya, obat batuk, pilek, serta radang tenggorokan pada anak. "Sudah tersedia dalam bentuk sirup dengan isi ekstrak jahe, cengkeh, lengkuas, kapulaga, dan kunyit yang berefek antiradang lalu dipermanis dengan madu atau gula aren."

Seiring dengan meredanya batuk, pilek, serta radang tenggorokan, Amarullah mengimbau agar sistem imunitas diperkuat. Untuk itu, antibodi harus digenjot. "Bisa dengan mengonsumsi meniran." Untuk pencegahan serangan batuk pilek berulang, Amarullah memberikan tips sederhana.
Minum saja bandrek. "Bisa juga dengan mencampur setengah serbuk bandrek dengan jahe plus lengkuas ketika terasa suara mulai parau dan bindeng."

Red: irf
Rep: Reiny Dwinanda

Sweet Potatoes

We can debate the nutritional qualities of a food until we're blue in the face, but in the end, we still may not have a very accurate prediction of the health effects of that food. The question we need to answer is this one: has this food sustained healthy traditional cultures?

I'm currently reading a great book edited by Drs. Hugh Trowell and Denis Burkitt, titled Western Diseases: Their Emergence and Prevention. It's a compilation of chapters describing the diet and health of traditional populations around the world as they modernize.

The book contains a chapter on Papua New Guinea highlanders. Here's a description of their diet:

A diet survey was undertaken involving 90 subjects, in which all food consumed by each individual was weighed over a period of seven consecutive days. Sweet potato supplied over 90 percent of their total food intake, while non-tuberous vegetables accounted for less than 5 percent of the food consumed and the intake of meat was negligible... Extensive herds of pigs are maintained and, during exchange ceremonies, large amounts of pork are consumed.

They ate no salt. Their calories were almost entirely supplied by sweet potatoes, with occasional feasts on pork.

How was their health? Like many non-industrial societies, they had a high infant/child mortality rate, such that 43 percent of children died before growing old enough to marry. Surprisingly, protein deficiency was rare. No obvious malnutrition was observed in this population, although iodine-deficiency cretinism occurs in some highlands populations:

Young adults were well built and physically fit and had normal levels of haemoglobin and serum albumin. Further, adult females showed no evidence of malnutrition in spite of the demands by repeated cycles of pregnancy and lactation. On the basis of American standards (Society of Actuaries, 1959), both sexes were close to 100 percent standard weight in their twenties.

The Harvard Pack Test carried out on 152 consecutive subjects demonstrated a high level of physical fitness which was maintained well into middle-age. Use of a bicycle ergometer gave an estimated maximum oxygen uptake of 45.2 ml per kilogram per minute and thus confirmed the high level of cardiopulmonary fitness in this group.

Body weight decreased with age, which is typical of many non-industrial cultures and reflects declining muscle mass but continued leanness.

There was no evidence of coronary heart disease or diabetes. Average blood pressure was on the high side, but did not increase with age. Investigators administered 100 gram glucose tolerance tests and only 3.8 percent of the population had glucose readings above 160 mg/dL, compared to 21 percent of Americans. A study of 7,512 Papuans from several regions with minimal European contact indicated a diabetes prevalence of 0.1 percent, a strikingly low rate. For comparison, in 2007, 10.7 percent of American adults had diabetes (1).

I'm not claiming it's optimal to eat nothing but sweet potatoes. But this is the strongest evidence we're going to come by that sweet potatoes can be eaten in quantity as part of a healthy diet. However, I wish I knew more about the varieties this group ate. Sweet potatoes aren't necessarily sweet. Caribbean 'boniato' sweet potatoes are dry, starchy and off-white. In the US, I prefer the yellow sweet potatoes to the orange variety of sweet potato labeled 'yams', because the former are starchier and less sweet. If I could get my hands on locally grown boniatos here, I'd eat those, but boniatos are decidedly tropical.

Instead, I eat potatoes, but I'm reluctant to recommend them whole-heartedly because I don't know enough about the traditional cultures that consumed them. I believe there are some low-CHD, low-obesity African populations that eat potatoes as part of a starch-based diet, but I haven't looked into it closely enough to make any broad statements. Potatoes have some nutritional advantages over sweet potatoes (higher protein content, better amino acid profile), but also some disadvantages (lower fiber, lower in most micronutrients, toxic glycoalkaloids).

three.

yesterday, my little girl turned 3! it's hard to believe how quickly she has grown up...part of me wants her to stay young forever and part of me gets so excited watching the little personality she is turning into. we celebrated with a pool party. it was her first b'day party w/ friends and she loved it (and it only rained half on the time). on her real b'day, i decided that i would make a second attempt at baking a giant cupcake for her class (for anyone who has followed this blog, my 1st attempt was a disaster). luckily, this time it actually worked...there happens to be a lot of web information on this cupcake and all the trouble it can cause....so beware if you are a beginner like myself- it's not as easy as it looks! luckily, it actually tasted okay too. here are some pictures from the weekend and yesterday....

on a different note, i have to say that taylor's b'day was met w/ a mixture of emotions...one of my best friends was in a horrible car accident w/ her children hours after leaving the party when her car hydroplaned. luckily, we are so blessed that the children were left untouched and she will be able to make a full, but slow recovery. when things like this happen, it makes you want to go around and tell everyone how much they mean to you. i love you B!