Dear Dr. E,

Thanks for your email. I started taking noni juice about 7 years ago when my boss came in to work with a bottle and asked me to try it. Of course at that time I couldn’t get past the taste of it and it was a few months before I eventually began consuming it on a daily basis. What I didn’t realize at the time was that Noni would change my life.

I have suffered with hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) my whole life and in particular have battled severe brain fog. At times this brain fog has been so overwhelming that I have felt desperate. I was eating the proper way you should with this condition by eating a low sugar/carb content diet and small protein snack throughout the day, etc. and even started exercising faithfully to try and combat it, but nothing would take away the brain fog. Anyhow I noticed that my brain fog COMPLETELY went away after I started taking Noni juice. On a few different occasions I have either run out of noni juice for a week or so or have forgotten to take it with me on vacations and after a week or so of not taking noni I get the terrible brain fog back. That was when I realized how well Noni was working for me. My brother, also suffers from low blood sugar and has also noticed that noni somehow regulates his blood sugar. Noni juice has truly improved my quality of life.

I have compared other brands of noni juice to yours and even tried the Hawaiian version (which did not work) and always end up purchasing from CAOH. I hope you will be around forever.

Kris O.

November 14, 2006

Dear Dr. Ettinger,

It was a pleasure to talk to you personally yesterday. As I told you on the phone, my husband’s results from goji juice have been truly miraculous. Who would have thought that one of God’s natural berries that He created could do so much for a persons health and life. The goji berry did just that for my husband Wayne.

Diagnosed 9 or so years ago with Lyme’s disease and rheumatoid arthritis he could do not much of anything. First he underwent a really severe back surgery that did not seem to work at the time. Next came years of severe pain and the inability to do much of nothing. He could not even walk most of the time. He just sat in a chair and even at this point he started having severe memory problems from the Lyme’s. It affects the short term memory. So anything that was told to him he forgot almost instantly. There were years that he took between 60 and 80 pills per day. I had to lay them out for him because his memory did not let him deal with that. Our children had to watch their father’s health fail rapidly. At this stage his walking became worse since the Lyme’s disease went straight to the joints now. He had to drag his legs to try to walk places. At one point while driving he could not get his leg off the gas pedal to stop our truck and that is when we sought another opinion from a Doctor. This is when it was found out that his hips were destroyed by the arthritis caused from the Lyme’s disease. He underwent bilateral hip replacements within a year’s time. By now he was really getting disgusted with his health. His cholesterol was out of control; his blood pressure was out of control and his body was no longer producing testosterone. Along with that the medicines they had him on were causing all kinds of side effects. By January of 2004 Wayne went off all but 3 of his medicines by himself. It’s funny because he was no worse or no better. At least most of those chemicals were starting to leave his body.

October of 2005 a friend introduced us to goji juice. I bought him a bottle and he took it. He felt it did not do anything but I had seen a slight difference in his energy level. He did not take it again until January of 2006. By this time he started taking 9 ounces a day because of all the reading I was doing on goji. In the summer of 2006, Wayne went off his cholesterol medicine on his own because of side effects of joint pain. When he went to his family Doctor, she was amazed because for the 1st time in all these years his cholesterol levels were great without the pills. She said to him, Wayne short of Divine intervention I can’t figure out hat is going on with your blood. He told her about God’s little goji berry. Next He went to his Rheumatologist and he took his own blood to check Wayne’s RA counts and it showed his RA was in remission. Next step was to go to his Endocrinologist. She reported after her own blood work that his testosterone was good again. How amazing is all of this. His energy level is fabulous and he is now on his way to great health again. I would have never believed that 9 years ago he would be where he is at today and I just thank God for all of this.

Yours truly

D.G.

Small Red Berry from Tibet Is Attracting a Lot of Attention

By BRITTANY OAT

July 14, 2006 – Although Ponce de Leon never found what he was looking for, the human quest for longevity continued.

Now nutritionist Earl Mindell, author of the bestselling book “The New Vitamin Bible,” believes he has discovered an anti-aging secret in the juice of a tiny, red berry called goji.

“I have never seen anything like this,” Mindell said.

Despite the fact that goji has only been tested on humans in one published study, a simple Internet search reveals hundreds of websites selling goji juice, dried goji berries and even goji plants.

Goji is now available in products on your supermarket shelves and has recently become the subject of some experimental cancer treatments. But does it work?

“We Are A Sick Nation”

Mindell said he learned about the medicinal properties of goji, also known as Lycium Barbarum, from an Asian healer he met on a visit to the Himalayan Mountains in 1996.

For more than 6,000 years, herbalists in China, Tibet and India have used goji because they believe it helps them regulate their blood pressure, prevent cancer, balance blood sugar levels and protect their body from premature aging, he said.

“In that part of the world it is not unusual for people to live to be 100 years old, Mindell said.

In Bapan Village, a remote town in Bama County of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southern China, seven of its 515 residents are centenarians, according to China’s 2000 census -  that’s 1.4 percent of the population. As comparison, only about two-hundredths of a percent of Americans become centenarians, according to Census figures.

“We’re not dying of old age in this country, we’re dying of degenerative diseases,” Mindell said. “Wake up America: We are a sick nation.”

A 1994 study in the Chinese Journal of Oncology found that 79 cancer patients responded better to their cancer treatments when goji was added to their regimen.

Dr. Victor Marcial-Vega, an oncologist from Hato Rey, Puerto Rico, said that he agrees with those findings, and has been using goji to ease the side effects chemotherapy and radiation is his own cancer patients.

In his 2005 study, which has not been published, 80 percent of his patients who took goji while undergoing cancer treatment maintained a healthy blood count, and 87 percent experienced changes that indicated their immune systems may have improved, he said. “The results are so dramatic that the doctors will never go back to saying never use antioxidants with chemotherapy,” he said.

Commentary: I agree with Dr. Mindell 100%, I have never seen anything like it either. The testimonials we receive from happy customers are phenomenal. Since we [California Academy of Health] added camu-camu fruit to the juice the phones won’t stop ringing with orders for the juice. Consumers are becoming more educated about the health products available to them and that’s a good thing. “C.A.O.H. offers a superior goji juice product that today’s educated consumer is looking for, at an affordable price.” Dr. Marcus Ettinger DC, BSc.

Q: Ok, here is a specific question. Stated in the literature of Goji, it says that is can be beneficial for people with the onset of diabetes. Will it lower blood sugar in someone who has had diabetes for a while and is taking medication? And what are the long term benefits?

This information is not specific in the items I have read on the internet.

Thank you.

A: Teresa,

Diabetes is a self created condition, meaning it is caused by long term carbohydrate intake. Eventually the body can’t metabolize the sugar any more so the body putting it into the blood rather than the cell. As long as a person hasn’t developed insulin dependency the condition (in my opinion) can be reversed. A low glycemic diet needs to be followed religiously!

As far as goji juice goes: there is data I have read that suggests it will aid in reducing glucose levels. What it will do on an individual basis I can’t answer that.

I know that a person’s diet is the most important aspect to correcting non-insulin dependent diabetes. Next comes antioxidants of which goji possesses high levels.

Literature suggests that the long term benefits of consuming goji, is greater health and wellbeing.

Sincerely,

Marcus Ettinger DC, BSc.

Q: Dear Sir,

I would like very much to drink the Goji Juice. Someone mentioned to me that people that are taking the blood thinner Coumadin have to be very careful because the Goji Juice will thin the blood even more. Will you please write back and let me know if this is true and how much it would normally effect the thinness of the blood.

I take Coumadin for Atrial Fibrillation and must keep my blood between 2-3.

Thank you for any help concerning this matter.

Jon

A: John,

This has to be your call. I have provided the only data available relating the two. It is weak at best but it is one vote against taking the two together. This is a decision that should be made by you and your cardiologist.

Note: This one person case study showed that goji may weakly inhibit Coumadin’s ability to thin the blood, in a test tube.

Sincerely,

Marcus Ettinger DC. BSc.

Ann Pharmacother. 2001 Oct;35(10):1199-201.

Possible interaction between warfarin and Lycium barbarum L.
Lam AY, Elmer GW, Mohutsky MA.
Department of Pharmacy, University of Washington, Seattle 98104-3031, USA. aylam@u.washington.edu

OBJECTIVE: To describe a patient who was stabilized on warfarin and developed an elevated international normalized ratio (INR) after drinking a concentrated Chinese herbal tea. Additionally, to determine the effect of the tea on CYP2C9, the isoenzyme responsible for the metabolism of S-warfarin. CASE SUMMARY: An elevated INR of 4.1 was observed in a 61-year-old Chinese woman, previously stabilized on anticoagulation therapy (INR 2-3). With no changes in her other medications or lifestyle, a review of her dietary habits revealed four days of drinking a concentrated Chinese herbal tea made from Lycium barbarum L. fruits (3-4 glasses daily) prior to her clinic visit Warfarin was withheld for one day and then resumed at a lower weekly dose. She discontinued the tea, while maintaining consistency with medications and dietary habits. A follow-up INR seven days later was 2.4, and seven subsequent INR values were in the 2.0-2.5 range. DISCUSSION: L barbarum L. (family Solanaceae) is a commonly used Chinese herb considered to have a tonic effect on various organs. Any impact of an herbal product on the metabolism of S-warfarin, the enantiomer responsible for most of the anticoagulant activity, could alter the INR values. An herbal-drug interaction was suspected in this case. In vitro (test tube) evaluation showed inhibition of S-warfarin metabolism by CYP2C9 by the tea of L. barbarum L.; however, the inhibition observed was weak, with a dissociation constant (Ki) value of 3.4 mg/mL, suggesting that the observed interaction may be caused by factors other than the CYP450 system. CONCLUSIONS: There is a potential herbal-drug interaction between warfarin and L. barbarum L., based on an increased INRvalue noted with concurrent use. Thus, combination of L. barbarum L. and warfarin should be avoided. Vigilance is needed with other herbal combinations taken with drugs of narrow therapeutic indices.