One of the most important bioactive compounds in medicinal mushrooms are Beta-D-glucans. Beta-glucans are bioactive carbohydrates (a type of polysaccharides). They are considered important because of their ability to modulate the immune function by triggering certain receptors of our immune system. There are no side-effects and there is no chance of developing a tolerance.

Modulation means, simply put: to boost it when it’s low and get it back in line when it’s over-reacting (like, in case of allergies and many auto-immune problems).

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Considered a true natural BRM (Biological Response Modifier) beta-glucans are an exceptional powerful tool to gain and maintain good health and quality of life.

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Medicinal mushrooms are not the only suppliers of beta-glucan. Beta-glucans are also found in e.g. oats, barley and yeast. In 1997, the FDA even approved of a claim that a daily intake of at least 3 g of beta-glucan from oats decreased saturated fats and reduced the risk of heart disease.

Yeast-derived beta-glucan is popular in particular because it is relatively cheap. One of the most common sources of beta-glucan for dietary supplements is baker’s / brewer’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae).

This particular yeast is available in huge quantities, almost for free, because it is an industrial waste product. Most of it is usually sold as a cheap animal feed supplement. The majority of beta-glucan supplements are based on this yeast-derived beta-glucan.

So, what is better ?

Sometimes the question comes up what is ‘better’ : the yeast-based beta-glucan supplements or the mushroom extracts where beta-glucan is the main bioactive ingredient.

The answer can be found in research, if you know where to look for it.

After reviewing the available research it is obvious that mushroom beta-glucan has significantly more therapeutic potential, offers much better value for money and yields much better results.

Although the exact mechanism is still a subject of discussion, the reason is most likely that mushroom-based beta-glucan molecules have a more complex structure (i.p. branching), have a much higher molecular weight and part of the mushroom beta-glucan is linked to proteins/peptides. A combination which has also shown promising immunological effects (proteo-glycans as found in Coriolus PSP -Turkey Tail-, Maitake and Reishi). One of the main researchers investigating beta-glucans and their therapeutic potential is Vaclav Vetvicka Ph.D. (University of Louisville, USA). He published many papers on the subject.

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In recent years Vetvicka got commercially involved with a leading manufacturer of yeast beta-glucan, leading to an impossible-to-miss bias in his test results, unfortunately.

In his most recent papers when comparing supplements against each other the mushroom products involved are either non-extracted or low potency, impure products from countries such as Korea or Hungary. Biomass-based products (such as Host Defense) are also included, although these are 60 - 70% starch. No wonder his preferred product always 'wins'.

That being said, in his older publications he is comparing well-known good quality products against each other. Although these papers are still flawed in several ways (like: samples were not tested for actual beta-glucan content ? other immune-modulating compounds present were not taken into account ?) there are interesting results.

Beta-glucan: Silver-bullet-or-hot-air (2010) is a research paper where 16 commercially available beta-glucan-containing supplements were tested for efficacy.

Two of these were mushroom-only (PSK and Maitake Gold), one was a barley-based product, one was a mix of mushroom- and yeast-derived beta-glucan. The remaining 12 were all yeast-based. The product that scored best was the yeast-based Glucan #300 (Transfer Point), followed very closely by the Maitake extract.

However, what was left out in the conclusion is that the Maitake extract (Maitake Gold) contains only ≥ 20 % purified beta-glucans (revealed in B2B communication), whereas Glucan #300 guarantees ≥ 83 - 86% of beta-glucans. In other words, the Maitake product only had 1/4 of the beta-glucans found in the yeast-based product. This was not taken into account during testing.

Taking this into account and looking at the test results again it is obvious that both the Maitake product and the PSK product (≥ 15 % beta-glucan) outclass all other products easily. Compared against the number one of the list the difference in therapeutic potential is minimal even though the beta-glucan content is only 1/4 of that number one, Transfer Point’s Glucan #300.

Another research paper is An Evaluation of the Immunological Activities of Commercially Available β1,3-Glucans (2007) which shows a similar outcome.

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Summarizing:

• the existing research shows mushroom extracts containing ≥ 20% beta-glucan to be almost as active as yeast-derived beta-glucan supplements with a purity of ≥ 83 - 86 %. In other words, to achieve a similar effect on the immune system you get from taking a high-quality mushroom extract you’ll have to take ± 4 x the amount of yeast beta-glucans.
• Mushroom extracts contain much more bioactive ingredients than just (1>3)(1>6)beta-D-glucans, including other types of bioactive beta-glucans, sterols, triterpenes and trace minerals. Glucans linked to peptides / proteins (proteo-glycans and polysaccharide-peptides) are also present. It is very likely there is a synergy between these bioactives, increasing the therapeutic potential.
• Mushroom extracts contain mostly soluble beta-glucan, whereas yeast beta-glucan is mostly insoluble. Soluble polysaccharides (such as mushroom-beta-glucans) bind to bile acids in the small intestine, making them less likely to enter the body; this in turn lowers cholesterol levels in the blood.
  
  They also attenuate the absorption of sugar, reduce sugar response after eating, normalize blood lipid levels and, once fermented in the colon, these soluble glucans produce short-chain fatty acids as byproducts with wide-ranging physiological activities. Insoluble glucans such as found in yeast have a more limited therapeutic potential.

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The conclusion therefore can only be that mushroom extracts are to be preferred over yeast-derived beta-glucan supplements. They achieve a similar immune-modulating effect at a significant lower dosage and on top of that have many other beneficial health effects not found in yeast beta-glucan products.

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Last minute addition: one of our customers sent us the following statement. It is more proof of the baffling ignorance one can come across on the internet:


This unsubstantiated statement was a quote taken from the cancerdefeated website. It shows a complete lack of understanding of the digestive system. NOTHING is absorbed in the stomach. The stomach works like a large blender. It only prepares food for further digestion/absorption and 'processing' in the intestines. See this link for a brief description of the digestive process.

Statements such as these prove again how important it is to do your due diligence before spending your money. Marketeers will say anything to sell their product, and the internet is mostly unsupervised - as a customer you are unprotected.

If you've ever visited an anti-quackery website, you might have noticed that one of the standards they use to define a 'snake oil' product is that it claims to help for a lot, if not all health problems. Our immune system, if we could bottle and sell it, would definitely be classified as 'quackery' using that standard, and it would probably never receive the FDA stamp of approval.

It lacks a so-called 'single identifiable active ingredient' which can define the 'mechanism of action‘. Since the main action of e.g. medicinal mushrooms is balancing the immune function and, by doing so, restoring both health and the quality of life, they are very suspect in the eyes of the anti-quacks. Too good to be true = snake oil = quackery. Although these anti-quacks are often right, they are wrong this time.

Let's see how the immune system operates.

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The Anatomy of the Immune System

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A simplified overview of the immune system

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We share the planet with countless pathogens, such as bacteria and viruses. The immune system is the human body’s defence against these 'foreign invaders'. Consisting of a complex network of cells, tissues, and organs, the immune system involves a sensitive process of checks and balances within the body that produce an immune response that is prompt, accurate, effective and self-limiting. As a result, scientists believe that a healthy immune system can be compared both in scope and complexity to the workings of our brain and nervous system - and it is every bit as important for survival.

How does the body’s immune system function? What are the main factors that influence its ability to fight infection and disease? Here's a layman’s explanation.

The ability of the immune system to protect the body is based on an incredibly elaborate and dynamic regulatory-communications network. A complex network of cells, tissues and organs stationed throughout the body passes information back and forth, like clouds of bees swarming around a hive. This includes the lymphoid organs because they are concerned with the growth, development, and deployment of lymphocytes - the white cells in the blood that are the key operatives of the immune system. Lymphocytes come in several varieties -- we'll explain those below.

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Lympocytes (orange) attacking cancer cells

Scanning Electron Microscopic image.

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Apart from the blood and the lymphatic vessels that carry lymphocytes to and from the other structures in the body, lymphoid organs include the bone marrow, thalamus, lymph nodes, spleen, tonsils, adenoids and the appendix. There are about 600 lymph nodes (or glands) most of them clustered around the neck, groin, and armpits. As lymph flows through the body, it filters the body of disease. During an examination, doctors often feel the lymph nodes in the neck to see if they are swollen. Swollen lymph nodes mean that the nodes are producing additional white blood cells because the body is fighting an infection.

Cells destined to become immune cells are, like all other blood cells, produced in the bone marrow, the soft tissue in the hollow shafts of long bones. Here, they develop into two major types of lymphocytes called B cells and T cells. While B cells complete their maturation in the bone marrow, T cells migrate to the thymus, an organ that lies high behind the breastbone, where they multiply and mature into cells capable of producing an immune response. Once they have matured, some lymphocytes congregate in immune organs or lymph nodes while others use the blood circulation as well as a body-wide network of lymphatic vessels to travel widely and continuously throughout the body.

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Macrophage (orange) attacking E-Coli bacteria (green)

Scanning Electron Microscopic image.

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Another type of white blood cells called macrophages (which can be translated as 'big eaters') reinforces the work of the lymphocytes because they engulf and digest micro-organisms and antigens.

Along with white blood cells, the immune system employs a complex system of small, bean-shaped lymph nodes in the neck, armpits, abdomen, and groin to create lymphatic routes for the body. Each lymph node contains specialised compartments that house platoons of B cells, T cells, and other cells capable of sparking an immune response. Clusters of lymphoid tissue can be found in many parts of the body, such as around the mucous membranes lining the respiratory and digestive tracts that serve as gateways into the body. They include the tonsils and adenoids and the appendix. Further, the immune system deploys the spleen, a fist-sized organ at the upper left of the abdomen, as a filter for the blood. In the spleen, B cells become activated and produce large amounts of antibodies. Also, old red blood cells are destroyed in the spleen.

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Activating the Immune System

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The immune system has many different types of cells acting together to take care of unwanted infections and altered cells. Cytokines are the chemicals produced by these cells in order to communicate and orchestrate the attack. Binding to specific receptors on target cells, cytokines recruit many other cells and substances to the field of action. Cytokines also encourage cell growth, promote cell activation, direct cellular traffic, and destroy target cells.

Cytokines include interleukins and growth factors, but another cytokine - interferon - is considered especially important because it can boost the immune system’s ability to recognise foreign invaders.

In humans, there are three major classes of interferon: alpha, beta and gamma. Because interferon is considered an effective anti-viral agent, and is important both for orchestrating and stimulating the immune system response, it is used to treat Hepatitis C and other diseases. Moreover, researchers have shown that pharmaceutical interferon, given in daily doses, can prevent infection and illness.

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Vials of Interferon.

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However, pharmaceutical forms of interferon can cause side effects such as nosebleeds and are not considered useful in treating established colds.

While researching medicinal mushrooms, it became evident that some of them are immune-regulators, substances that can quiet or activate the immune system, depending on the particular circumstances. An immune-regulator quiets an overactive immune system, and it increases activity when the immune system is sluggish. Basically, an immune-regulator triggers the production of white blood cells when the system is under-active, and it lowers their number when the system is overactive (allergies, various auto-immune diseases, etc.).

Cordyceps sinensis e.g. was found to stimulate the production of interferon. More about the specific effects of medicinal mushrooms in a later article..

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How the Body Mounts an Immune Response

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The immune system is considered one of the most sophisticated systems in the human body because it displays several remarkable characteristics. The central duty of the immune system is to distinguish between what belongs to the body - 'self' - and what doesn’t belong to the body - 'non-self'- .

For this reason, every cell that originates in the body has distinctive molecules - identification papers, so to speak - that mark it as 'self'. But when the immune system encounters an antigen - the substance that announces the cell or organism is 'non-self' - the immune troops move quickly to eliminate the intruders.

What happens is that the presence of the antigen signals interferon or another cytokine to trigger an immune response by either the B or T cells. When the foreign microbe presents an antigen on the surface of one of these cells, the B or T cells multiply and produce antibodies that specifically bind to that antigen.

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Patient with psoriasis.
Psoriasis is an auto-immune disease.

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This trigger response then leads to other parts of the immune system engulfing and killing the invading cells or to what is known as the 'complement destruction cascade', where serum proteins called 'complement' bind to the immobilised antibodies and destroy the bacteria by creating holes in them.

Whenever T cells and B cells are activated, some turn into 'memory-cells' that enable the immune system to remember previous experiences and react accordingly. Thus, if a person were to contract chicken pox, the immune system would produce memory cells for this disease, resulting in future immunity. Long-term or 'specific' immunity can be naturally acquired by previous infection or artificially acquired by vaccines made from infectious agents.

Problems in the immune system come in two varieties. When the immune system is under-active, it makes you susceptible to infections, cancer, and other illnesses. When it is overactive, it may create allergies and autoimmune reactions.

Auto-immune means the immune system is overstimulated and mistakenly attacks the body. Diseases such as diabetes, lupus, psoriasis and lymphoma are autoimmune diseases. AIDS, hepatitis, the flu, and colds, on the other hand, are associated with a weakened, under-active immune system.

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Factors that affect the Immune System

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A foetus already has an immune response and once born, he or she has a fully intact natural immune response. That system is stimulated after birth (more 'acquired' immunity) and reaches its peak at the onset of puberty, between ages 11 and 15 (sometimes later, if a child lives in a hygienic environment).

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When we age our immune function starts to decline.
Many old age related diseases are related to this.
A well-functioning immune system is essential for a good quality of life.

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Then, starting at age 35 or so, the immune system starts making mistakes. Some parts are active while others are lazy, and some parts may overdo it and perhaps cause autoimmune disorders.

After age 50 a steady decline sets in, leading to all kinds of old-age diseases.

While the elderly produce the same number of lymphocytes as their younger counterparts, their configuration is different leading to less vigorous and less effective infection-fighting cells.

To be blunt, the human body is not supposed to live long past that age. Nature wants you to make room for subsequent generations after your fiftieth birthday.

At the same time, research points to psychological stress, lack of adequate sleep, poor diet and lack of exercise as factors that affect the immune system.

Because stress produces many different effects on the endocrine systems, including the well-known fight or flight response, scientists hypothesise that the abilities of the immune system are diminished after frequent activation of the autonomic nervous system in the case of chronic stresses.

For example, a large study comparing the parents of children with cancer with parents whose children were relatively healthy showed that chronic psychological stress might reduce the immune system's reactions to hormonal secretions that were normally used to fight the inflammatory response.

Regarding the link between sleep and the immune system, research summarised by the National Sleep Foundation finds that sleep deprivation weakens the immune system, increasing susceptibility to colds and the flu (both caused by a virus). It is also not uncommon for people who suffer from sleep deprivation to suffer from other problems including diabetes, asthma or a second sleep disorder. Another example is the ulcer.

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Helicobacter pylori bacteria on the surface of the human intestine
Scanning Electron Microscopic image

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Many people believe ulcers are directly caused by stress. This is not true; ulcers are caused by the Heliobacter Pylori, a nasty bacteria (identified for the first time in 1982) that lives in our stomach, but is not causing problems in 80% of those infected with it. But if we are under stress of whatever nature, this stress might affect our immune system. Which can make a 'harmless' bacteria turn into a potentially life-threatening one (stomach cancer might also be caused by the Heliobacter Pylori). Another example of the importance of a well-functioning immune system.

The role of nutrition in determining the strength of the immune system has also been widely studied. According to a number of studies, both undernourished people and those who are overweight or obese are at greater risk from infections. At the same time, research suggests that reducing the amount of fat in the diet may increase immune activity. For these reasons, nutritionists recommend a well-balanced diet that includes plenty of fruit, vegetables, low-fat dairy products and whole grains. In one placebo-controlled study of healthy elderly adults, daily consumption of a multivitamin- multi-mineral supplement already resulted in fewer days of infection-related illnesses.

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Most people automatically assume that the daily dose as recommended by the supplier on the product label makes sense and is rooted in research.
During our investigation of the available scientific research we found that this assumption is in general not justified. The majority of dose recommendations appears to be arbitrary.

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Still, some people might need less and some might need more, depending on age, weight and their general health-condition. In general -healthy- people below the age of 35 need less (e.g. 2 capsules daily), while when you're over 50 more might be necessary for the desired effect (at least 2 grams daily). The reason behind this is that the immune function of humans is optimal before the age of 35, and declines significantly after 50, which can lead to all kinds of 'old-age related' ailments (5).

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Low potency products

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References

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(1)
• Bioavailability of Medicinal Mushroom Supplements
(2)
• Harada T, Miura N, Adachi Y, Nakajima M, Yadomae T, Ohno N. Effect of SCG, 1,3-b-D-Glucan from Sparassis Crispa on the Hematopoietic response in Cyclophosphamide Induced Leukopenic mice. Biol Pharm Bul 2002;25: 931-9
• Carolyn J. Torkelson et. al. - Phase 1 Clinical Trial of Trametes versicolor (= Coriolus versicolor) in Women with Breast Cancer. ISRN Oncology, Volume 2012, Article ID 251632
• Babineau TJ, Hackford A, Kenler A, Bistrian B, Forse RA, Fairchild PG, et al. A phase II multicenter double-blind ran- domized placebo-controlled study of three dosage of an immunomodulator (PGG-glucan) in high-risk surgical patients. Arch Surg 1994;129:1204-10.
• Dalia Akramienė et. al. - Effects of b-glucans on the immune system. Medicina (Kaunas) 2007; 43(8)
• Deng, G., et al. - A phase I/II trial of a polysaccharide extract from Grifola frondosa (Maitake mushroom) in breast cancer patients: Immunological effects. J. Canc. Res. Clin. Oncol., 135: 1215-1221
(3)
• Carolyn J. Torkelson et. al. - Phase 1 Clinical Trial of Trametes versicolor (= Coriolus versicolor) in Women with Breast Cancer. ISRN Oncology, Volume 2012, Article ID 251632
(4)
Dorothy Cimino Brown and Jennifer Reetz - Single Agent Polysaccharopeptide Delays Metastases and Improves Survival in Naturally Occurring Hemangiosarcoma. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine Volume 2012, Article ID 384301
(5)
• Burns, E.A. - Effects of aging on immune function. J Nutr Health Aging. 2004;8(1):9-18
• Aging changes in immunity
• The Immune System in the Elderly: A Fair Fight Against Diseases? • Suzanne C. Segerstrom, et. al. - Psychological Stress and the Human Immune System: A Meta-Analytic Study of 30 Years of Inquiry. Psychol Bull. 2004 July ; 130(4): 601–630
• Ann O'Leary - Stress, Emotion and Human Immune Function. Psychol Bull. 1990 ; 108(3): 363-382
• Firdaus S. Dhabhar - Enhancing versus Suppressive Effects of Stress on Immune Function: Implications for Immunoprotection versus Immunopathology. Allergy, Asthma, and Clinical Immunology, Vol 4, No 1 (Spring), 2008: pp 2–11

What is stress ?

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Stress is mostly based on ’perception’ and therefore it is subjective. In other words, what is perceived as ‘stressful’ is what causes stress. Most people will associate stress mainly with being very busy and feeling pressured, which causes mental anxiety. They’re right, but there’s more to it.

Stress at its core is a defensive response to external factors. Physical, mental and environmental triggers all can and do cause stress or symptoms of stress. Stress is a constellation of events, consisting of a stimulus (the stressor) that causes a reaction in the brain (the perception of stress; anxiety) which in turn activates physiologic fight-or-flight systems in the body (the stress response).

Acute stress (defined as lasting minutes to maybe a few hours) can actually have beneficial effects on the immune system, but chronic stress (defined as lasting several hours daily for weeks, months or years, even) can create havoc in our body and mind. If the stress is chronic the stress response will get exhausted, and eventually will lead to unpredictable and unbalancing effects on our health and well-being. The physical side-effects of stress are mainly caused by chronic -mental- stress.

Physical stressors have been defined as external challenges to homeostasis (homeostasis is, simply put, the healthy balance between all bodily functions; this balance should be as constant as possible for optimal health and well-being) and mental stressors can be defined as ‘the anticipation, justified or not, that a challenge to homeostasis looms’. This ‘anticipation’ is what triggers several fight-or-flight systems in the body; this is what we call the ‘stress response’.

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Chronic Stress

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Chronic stress is everywhere. It has become a part of our life to such an extent that we no longer notice it as such. In general chronic stress was found to suppress and dysregulate natural and adaptive immune responses through a wide variety of mechanisms.
Science associates stress with increased arousal or anxiety, increased blood pressure, gastrointestinal dysfunction, and suppression of the immune response (also see the publications listed earlier in this newsletter). It has also been linked to seasonal and general depression, the postpartum period, chronic fatigue/fibromyalgia syndromes, allergies, ulcers and even cancer, to name just a few.

Some common examples of stress:

• Hard and continued physical labor
• Unusual and continued high levels of physical exercise (e.g. professional and semi-professional athletes are more likely to develop health problems because of that)
• Unusual levels of mental pressure, including but not limited to being busy continuously, having to make decisions all the time, being forced to multitask, and experiencing never-ending triggers from external sources, such as living in an urban environment (noise, pollution, visual stimuli).

Since it is very difficult, not to say almost impossible for most people to evade or escape stress the key question is ‘How do we deal with it ?’

How can we adapt easily and without too much effort to the never-ending barrage of external stressors ?

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Stress Management on the Mental Level

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As mentioned earlier, stress is for a big part rooted in ’perception’; what is perceived as ‘stressful’ by one individual is perceived as ‘nothing special or everyday routine’ by another.

Wouldn’t it be great if this subjective experience could be controlled, preferably in a natural way ?

Meditation, T’ai Chi and yoga are examples of traditional do-it-yourself stress-control, but they take time. Paradoxically, that same feeling of stress and anxiety one is trying to reduce can be a barrier when trying to get in the mood for doing these exercises.

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Yoga is a great way to release stress

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Stress Management on the Physical Level

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If stress is starting to affect your physical health, you are entering a potentially dangerous spiral. Probably the first people to look into the subject were the Soviets in the 1940s, although their goal was formulated somewhat differently. It started with Order No 4654-p of the People’s Commissars Council of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (March 4, 1943).

It concerned research work ‘with the purpose of finding […] tonic substances’ for both soldiers and persons working in the Russian defense industry during the Second World War.
Tonic substances that would increase ‘the state of non-specific resistance’ under conditions of stress. They wanted to improve the ability of people to adapt quickly and easily to external triggers of whatever nature, turning them into super-soldiers.

That’s when the term ‘adaptogens’ was coined.

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Stalin himself ordered the research that would lead to the discovery of adaptogens

As originally defined, an adaptogen was a substance that had to:

• show some non-specific effect, such as increasing bodily resistance to physically, chemically, or biologically harmful agents or factors;
• have a normalising influence on a ‘disturbed / diseased’ (pathological) state, independent of the nature of that state; and
• be harmless in itself and does not disturb the body function at a normal level.

Adaptogens are part of a new class of metabolic regulators that increase the ability to adapt to and avoid damage by external/environmental -stress- factors. Since 1997, the term ‘adaptogen’ has been used as a functional term by Russian health-regulatory authorities, and in 1998 this term was allowed as a functional claim for certain products by the United States’s FDA. The primary site of action of adaptogens appears to be the HPA (the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis) which is responsible for the release of cortisol as a reaction to stress; and their secondary sites of action are the liver and specific components of the immune and cardiovascular systems.

Below is a list of the most interesting adapogens.

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Conclusion

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These supplements are part of a new class of premium dietary tools. They are true natural biological response modifiers, designed using science but rooted in tradition.

Introduction

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When we decided to add Reishi to our product line, we asked ourselves the following questions:

• Why should one choose a Reishi extract instead of, for example, a Chaga extract ?
• After having the answer to that, what properties should the best Reishi product possible have ? (because that is what we were after)
• What other Reishi products are currently available and how good are they ?

The first two questions could be answered quickly.
We discovered that what makes Reishi stand out from other medicinal mushrooms is the combination of bioactives; water-soluble beta-glucans (including glyco-proteins/proteo-glycans; fancy names for protein- and peptide-linked beta-glucans) and alcohol-soluble triterpenes, many of which are unique for Reishi. (see our Reishi monograph for all details - here)

These compounds appear to have a powerful synergistic effect when combined, so it was obvious our product should be a dual extract (meaning a combination of a hot water extract and an alcohol extract) with high percentages of these bioactives in a bioavailable form.

Therefore the source material should be red Reishi fruiting bodies, cultivated on wood logs (also known as 'duanwood': meaning 'original wood', the same wood Reishi grows on in nature). Research papers showed that this combination produces the highest level of bioactives.

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Mapping the competition

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Non-extracted products

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Example of a Reishi tincture supplement facts label. There is no indication of bioactive ingredients, so the consumer has no idea what he is buying.

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Our first step while researching the competition was to separate the extracts from the non-extracted products and tinctures.

Non-extracted mushroom products are indigestible for most people, so their therapeutic potential is unpredictable. (See this article for the details about this.)

Tinctures and infusions without a specification of bioactives on the supplement facts label should also be classified as having limited therapeutic potential - most, if not all of them are just non-extracted Reishi powder in alcohol and/or water with an unverifiable therapeutic potential.

Unverifiable, because the producer cannot and does not guarantee any bioactives. There is not a single Reishi tincture that has specifications of the bioactives on the supplement facts label. In terms of therapeutic potential tinctures are the worst, right after non-extracted products. A detailed explanation why mushroom tinctures are best avoided in general can be found here.

The main idea seems to be that extraction will happen in the bottle over time. This won't work well - see this link for an explanation and also see the description of extraction, elsewhere in this article.

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Hot water extracts

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In line with our other mushroom extracts, we wanted a Reishi product with the full spectrum of bioactives, in particular because, as said before, our research showed that what sets Reishi apart from other medicinal mushrooms is the combination of bioactive beta-glucans and triterpenes, several of which are only found in Reishi.

Triterpenes are alcohol solubles, so all hot-water-only extracts could be discarded as well - hot water extracts do not contain the non-water solubles (triterpenes, sterols) in a bioavailable form. Rule of thumb: If the triterpenes are not specified on the label you better look elsewhere: such a Reishi product offers almost no -if any- Reishi-specific effects because the triterpenes are not present. That's basic logic.

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Dual -full-spectrum- extracts

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With the non-extracted products and the hot-water-only extracts filtered out there were still quite a few Reishi extracts left in the competition.

One of the best competitors (probably the best - we were not able to find a more potent product) was a product called ReishiMax ($ 1.25 - 1.48 per gelatin capsule). The specifications show 13.5% polysaccharides and 6% triterpenes. (Nobody is specifying the beta-glucan fraction, like ORIVeDA does).

ORIVeDA's specifications (over 15% beta-glucans and over 6 % triterpenes) are significantly better in comparison, and the value for money is twice as good: $0.63 per vegetarian capsule.

The HongKong Consumer Council compared 26 Reishi supplements several years ago (Choice magazine #286, August 15, 2000), to determine their value for money.

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Suppliers

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Most suppliers do cut some corners while trying to find a balance between quality and price. Their main motivation is usually 'the cheaper the better', not the therapeutic quality of the product.

Instead of using Reishi fruiting bodies grown on wood logs (considered the best method) they use fruiting bodies grown on sawdust or rice-grown mycelia (mycelia = the mushroom's 'roots'). Some actually do use the wood log method ('duanwood Reishi') but then use a flawed extraction method to cut costs (see the 'Extraction' paragraph; below).

The products resulting from these methods are at best a compromise both in terms of active ingredients and therapeutic potential. However, they are cheap, in particular the biomass-method (aka 'solid state cultivation') produces cheap source material, because mycelia develop exceptionally fast. Smart marketing, taking advantage of the average consumers ignorance is then used to make up for the lack of verifiable therapeutic quality.

More details about cultivation can be found in our monograph - here.

This Reishi is cultivated on wood logs, which are buried in nutrient-rich soil.

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Extraction

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Reishi has a very low yield of triterpenes, much lower then e.g. Chaga, a similar 'woody' mushroom. To get a good percentage of triterpenes AND a good percentage of beta-glucans, lengthy, labor intensive and therefore expensive multi-step extraction procedures are needed. (We leave hot water-only extracts out of the discussion - these are a compromise per definition, as explained before.)

Many producers of dual extracts, however, also make compromises during the extraction phase to keep the production costs low: they use e.g. a mix of water/ethanol to perform the extraction - the higher the percentage of ethanol in the mix, the higher the percentage of triterpenes and the lower the percentage of beta-glucans, and vice versa.

This single-step extraction works reasonably well but it results in a relatively crude extract with low purity. These 'dual extracts' are usually marketed as 'xx : 1' extracts - the actual percentages of beta-glucans/triterpenes are low and fluctuate significantly between production batches, so for competitive and legal reasons for the vendor it is better to leave such details out.

Instead, a lot of emphasis is placed on the fact that this is 'duanwood Reishi' or a similar property.

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Additives

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Specifications of a Japanese Reishi product. A 13:1 'extract'.

Additives are listed, but surprisingly none of the Reishi quality markers, such as triterpenes, beta-glucans or polyphenols are specified

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Triterpenes are oily and a high percentage (over ± 8%) will cause problems when the desired result is a stable powdered extract.

To prevent this suppliers add e.g. dextrin, malt-dextrin or starch to the product, usually just before the drying phase. These additives are polysaccharides but without therapeutic value. This makes it clear once again why polysaccharides are not a reliable quality indicator. It's obvious how easy it is to spike a mushroom supplement with useless polysaccharides without breaking the law. You pay for 20% polysaccharides, you get 20% polysaccharides, correct ? Most of the time these additives are not specified on the label.

We've seen Reishi products where up to 30% of dextrin had been added. The supplement facts label stated "35% polysaccharides" which is accurate in itself but leaves out the fact that these are mostly just useless sugar (dextrin).

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Conclusion

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We had to conclude, again, that 'cheap supplier' or 'cheap product' usually means a significant compromise when it comes to quality and therapeutic potential. On the other hand, 'expensive' is not a guarantee for quality either - as the Japanese products proved. And don't forget the 'value for money test' done by the HongKong Consumer Council…

For more general information about mushroom extracts, how to choose the right one and how to determine the value for money please read this link.

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What about Reishi spore products ?

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Broken spore and the spore oil products are relatively new Reishi products.
They are described as containing 'the essence of Reishi's therapeutic power', so these were one of the first options we investigated when we started to look for a Reishi product.

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Reishi spore oil capsules

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A Reishi spore is tiny: 5-8 microns in size, only visible with a microsope. Each spore contains a microscopic amount of 'spore oil', mostly triterpenes.

You'll need about 1000 kg Reishi mushrooms to collect 1 kg of spores. The spores are 'cracked' and the oil extracted using something called 'supercritical CO₂ extraction'. This is an expensive process and the yield is very very low. Around 20,000 kg of Reishi is needed for 1 liter of spore oil.

Spore products are therefore always very expensive. Three to four dollars for a small capsule is about the absolute minimum. If you're charged less, it is most likely a non-pure or plain fake product.