One of the main points of this post is the fact that :
' Although benign prostatic hyperplasia rarely causes symptoms before age 40, the occurrence and symptoms increase with age. Benign prostatic hyperplasia affects about 50 percent of men between the ages of 51 and 60 and up to 90 percent of men older than 80.2 . '
As quoted from here :
niddk.nih.gov/health-inform....
Those are very high percentages of BPH in men based on age, no matter how you slice it suggesting an extremely high incidence rate once you turn 51 years old.
An Anecdotal Report
A friend of mine with benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), was discussing the issue with me, knowing that I have some familiarity with supplements. He told me that among his symptoms, he had the following that he could remember at the moment :
1. High urgency to urinate with the feeling that he might not make it to the bathroom in time.
2. Once in front of the toilet, a high degree of difficulty and waiting for his urine flow to start.
3. Very frequent starting and stopping while urinating which he described as "Morse code" signaling and what he described as a feeling of having not fully emptied his bladder whenever he urinated.
4. Very frequent trips to the bathroom all day and all night with small amounts of urine being discharged at each visit.
5. Getting up 3 to 5 times per night to urinate small amounts of urine even though the urge to urinate was very strong.
6. Overall a significant decline in quality of life (QOL) due to having to work his life schedule around having to urinate so frequently. Also an increased anxiety level seemed to accompany all of his BPH symptoms, in his opinion.
After hearing his description of symptoms, I was thinking to myself, how miserable it must be to live with BPH. I have seen multiple anecdotal reports on the use of Grape Seed Proanthocyanidin Extract (GSPE) as helpful for BPH, but had seen no significant studies to support the use of GSPE for BPH. I mentioned this to him and told him that GSPE has a very good safety profile as seen in human studies in case he was interested in giving it a test. He asked me if I used it, and I told him yes, but not for BPH, but rather for general health based on multiple studies I had read about it.
I told him what supplement I was using and that I was taking the label recommended dose which was a significantly higher dose than I had seen on other GSPE supplement labels. He said he was going to try it and see how it worked.
Since the bottle will last 80 days at the label recommended dose, I said that one bottle should be more than enough to find out if the GSPE was going to be helpful in reducing his symptoms or not. I told him that if he didn't get any relief with that one bottle, then it likely was not worth ordering a second bottle. He said he agreed.
I reminded him that there are multiple risk factors for BPH, so it is possible that while anecdotal reports suggest that it works for some people, it is unlikely that it will work for everyone and he said he understood, but felt that, to him, it was worth a test. So I showed him the product that I use, he took a picture of it and said he would order it that day.
I didn't see him again for about 3 months and when we met, he said he had good news and proceeded to tell me about his experience after starting the GSPE at the label recommended dose of 3 capsules each day ( 1200 mg /day ). He said that within the first month he noticed that he didn't have to go to the bathroom as often and the urgency of having to urinate had declined very noticeably. He went on to say that in that first month most of his symptoms had noticeably declined gradually, but he said within the second month all of his BPH symptoms that he was aware of were simply gone and that the BPH seemed to be in a type of remission!
He said he planned to continue taking it because of the other health benefits I had mentioned about it as well as the fact that GSPE seemed to be holding the BPH in check.
I told him that I was very happy for him and he thanked me for recommending it. I mentioned to him that there are also studies suggesting that GSPE has potential anti-prostate cancer effects and while BPH does not lead to prostate cancer, that BPH can lead to other urinary and bladder issues, kidney infection and kidney failure, so since GSPE is working well to control his BPH, it is good that he will continue using it indefinitely.
This is the product that I use and he ordered to good effect :
amazon.com/Carlyle-Grape-Ex...
Although this remedy was effective for my friend with BPH, it is important to note that he had an actual diagnosis of BPH, because prostate cancer can have similar symptoms to BPH and although GSPE has shown potential to act as a prostate cancer preventative in studies, GSPE is not a treatment for prostate cancer and so it is clear that an actual diagnosis is of the utmost importance so precious time is not wasted in treatment of actual prostate cancer as opposed to BPH.
Lastly, I don't know if this will work for everyone and this is just an anecdotal report from my friend for whom GSPE alleviated his BPH symptoms within two months, or less than one bottle of the supplement he used.
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