The Health Benefits of Reishi Mushroom Extract

Reishi functional mushroom extract capsules - grown in the UK by Mushroom Culture

Background

Key compounds

The benefits of taking Reishi:

Background of the Reishi Mushroom

Reishi (Ganoderma spp.) is one of the most valuable mushrooms in Traditional Chinese Medicine and has been used for thousands of years across Asia (1). Reishi translates as the “divine mushroom of immortality”,demonstrating how revered this mushroom is. Reishi contributes to well-being in numerous ways, including:

reduced stress and fatigue
improved sleep
reduced anxiety and depression
improved metabolic function
healthier gut microbiome and
reduced inflammation.

The Key Compounds

The important physiologically active components found in Reishi are polysaccharides (water soluble) and triterpenoids (alcohol soluble). Reishi also contains beneficial amino acids, nucleosides, polyphenols and phenolic acids (2) which convey health benefits.

Over 150 triterpenoids have been found in Reishi! The diverse range of these beneficial compounds demonstrates Reishi’s impressive biological complexity (3).

Reishi is also rich in fibre and minerals such as potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, selenium, iron, zinc and copper(4).

What are the health benefits?

Enhanced sleep and relaxation
Healthier metabolism
Reduced fatigue
Improved mental well-being
Improve Liver and Kidney health

These key benefits of Reishi extract are explained further below, describing how they work along with the relevant studies.

Sleep and relaxation

Reishi is known for improving sleep quality and enhancing relaxation and has been used in China to help with insomnia and restlessness for many years. Studies in the U.S show 15-35% of adults suffer from sleep issues (5) and, even for those that don’t, we always feel better after a restful night's sleep, which Reishi can help achieve.

Reishi works to improve sleep in these main ways:

Increased amount of sleep promoting melatonin precursor - 5HTP (6)
Increased amounts of good gut bacteria (Bifidiobacterium) which have been associated with improved sleep (7)

A recent study found Reishi extract supplementation to be more effective than melatonin for improving sleep scores in those suffering from insomnia (8).

This study identified a wide range of compounds found in Reishi which may contribute to improved sleep. Some of these compounds work directly by affecting parts of the brain, such as the pineal gland, which is important for the functioning of our biological clock via melatonin production. Other compounds function peripherally by affecting the heart, thyroid and liver which may improve sleep quality and timing through less direct means (9).

Improved metabolism

Another benefit of taking Reishi is that it can help improve metabolic function:

Reishi encourages growth of beneficial gut microbes (e.g. bifidiobacterium) while suppressing growth of harmful varieties (e.g. proteobacteria)
Reishi can improve blood glucose regulation and insulin resistance

Reishi’s support of good bacteria such as Bifidiobacterium is important as these microbes are responsible for internal B-Vitamin production, help produce antioxidants and aid normal metabolism. Reishi also promotes beneficial Lactobacillus gut bacteria which aid digestion and promote immune health (7).

This review of many scientific studies demonstrated Reishi extracts can help lower and stabilize blood glucose levels by improving metabolic function (10). By helping to keep glucose levels more stable via healthy metabolism, Reishi can help maintain steady energy levels.

This demonstrates the importance of using separate mushroom material for the hot water and alcohol extract processes. This is because hot water extract encourages extraction of high molecular weight polysaccharides (which are important for gut microbiome health). Alcohol extraction can damage these polysaccharides but can extract other important, unique compounds such as terpenes (11)‍ .

Reduced fatigue from Reishi

Reishi is credited for improving relaxation and sleep, this can help with fatigue levels during the day. In this study of people with chronic fatigue syndrome, patients took a reasonable dose of 5.4g of Reishi extract blend per day for 8 weeks. Results demonstrated Reishi extract was significantly superior to the placebo for improving fatigue and well-being scores. In this study, they also noted that the supplement was well tolerated in the 123 participants (12).

Animal studies in otherwise healthy mice demonstrated reduced fatigue in those taking Reishi compared to those that were not. The mice taking Reishi extract were able to swim for longer and tests showed they had less lactic acid build up. This demonstrates Reishi could also be useful for improving exercise performance (13).

Improved mental well-being

The already mentioned benefits of Reishi including; improved sleep and relaxation, improved metabolism and gut health as well as reduced fatigue can all lead to improvements in mental well-being. Alongside these indirect benefits, Reishi extracts may directly improve mood and mental well-being in a number of ways:

Reishi can increase the amount of the serotonin precursor (5HTP) - enabling our bodies to make more serotonin (depleted serotonin levels are common in those experiencing mood disorders)
Reishi extract can also improve inflammation in the brain which can improve anxiety and depression (14) , (15)
Reishi extract has been found to increase Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) levels - this encourages the growth of neurons and improves brain functioning (16)

There are a number of studies that demonstrate Reishi extracts positive effect on mood and mental well-being. In this study of woman with fibromyalgia, those taking 6g per day of Reishi had a distinct trend of improved levels of happiness, life satisfaction and reduced depression (17).

In animal studies using quite a high doses of Reishi extract (equivalent to 12-18g in humans), researchers saw reduced anxiety levels comparable to diazipam (a commonly used pharmaceutical anti-anxiety drug) (18).

Another study used an alcohol extract of Reishi fruit body that was high in triterpenoids. They studied Reishi’s ability to improve anxiety and depression symptoms in mice. The study found improvement in depression-like behaviours (e.g. grooming behaviour and nest building activity) and improved anxiety scores for mice - measured by how adventurous they are in a commonly used maze test (19).

Improved liver and kidney health

Reishi has long been thought to improve the health of important organs in the body, now there are many scientific studies demonstrating Reishi’s ability to improve liver and kidney health and function.

The benefits to liver health caused by Reishi are mostly due to the triterpenoids found in the mushroom. Reishi extracts improve liver health in several ways:

Reduce oxidative stress in the liver
Alleviates inflammation in the liver (20)
Reduce the amount of collagen deposited at the liver (collagen accumulates in liver fibrosis disease) (21)

Reishi extract can be useful to detoxify the liver - this can help prevent and protect the liver from alcohol induced damage(22).

Reishi also plays a significant role in preventing and treating various kidney diseases (23).

Safety

Reishi mushroom has a long history of use dating back 2,000 years demonstrating it is a tried and tested natural remedy. This study demonstrated no adverse effects from taking 2g of Reishi extract for 10 days (24). And a study mentioned earlier in the report found Reishi was well tolerated in all 123 study participants taking 5.4g for 8 weeks (12). This recent review of Reishi found that, at appropriate doses, the mushroom extract does not trigger toxicity, side effects, or pose safety problems for individuals (25).

What is the extraction process?

In order to obtain the full health benefits of functional mushrooms, an extraction process is needed to make these compounds available for our bodies. We use a dual-extract process to extract the full range of beneficial compounds from our Reishi mushroom.

For more information on our extraction process, check out our ‘Mushroom Extracts Explained’ article.

Conclusion

Evidence from the scientific literature supports the safe use of Reishi mushroom extracts to treat a number of ailments and in promoting general health and well-being. There has been a lot of research into Reishi as a functional mushroom but more human clinical trials are needed to increase our knowledge.

Taking Reishi mushroom extract regularly appears to be a great way to improve sleep and relaxation, enhance our metabolism and microbiome, reduce fatigue, improve mental well-being and improve liver and kidney health .

Visit our shop to check out our UK grown and dual-extracted Reishi Extract Capsules and Reishi Extract Powders!