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Ginger Quieting That Queasy Feeling Nausea is a possible symptom of dozens of conditions and diseases, from Addison’s disease to traumatic brain injury. But it’s a prominent symptom of several. There’s motion sickness, when a disconnect between what you see and the way your body is moving confuses the balance center in your inner ear, producing nausea. There’s morning sickness, the nausea of early pregnancy that bedevils so many mothers-to-be. There’s medication-induced nausea, from anesthesia or chemotherapy. And there’s nausea from digestive upset, such as food poisoning. For thousands of years—in China, India, the Middle East, and the Roman Empire—traditional healers have turned to ginger to help quiet that queasy feeling. For the past few decades, scientists around the world have been proving that ginger works. Saying No to Nausea No matter the type of nausea, ginger just says no. Motion sickness. “Nausea associated with motion sickness is unpleasant.” That’s the scientific understatement of a team of gastroenterologists from the University of Michigan and National Ying-Ming University in Taiwan. But standard over-the-counter and prescription medications for motion sickness aren’t particularly pleasant either, they add—not only do they “produce incomplete symptom control,” but they also have “significant side effects, such as dry mouth, lethargy, and drowsiness.” Ginger, however, is a traditional Chinese remedy for motion sickness, said the researchers. And they set out to see not only if it worked, but how it worked. To do so, they asked 13 volunteers with a history of motion sickness (from car, boat, or plane travel) to sit in a spinning chair. Needless to say, they all became nauseated. But when the vol-
unteers took either 1,000 or 2,000 milligrams (mg) of ginger before they sat in the chair, it took them 35 percent longer to develop nausea, the nausea was less intense by 30 percent, and the nausea was far less severe 15, 30, and 45 minutes after the chair stopped spinning. (Both doses of ginger worked equally well.) In their study, the researchers also measured blood levels of vasopressin, a key hormone that helps regulates levels of water, salt, and blood sugar, and that the researchers theorized might
Ginger is a proven remedy to ease motion sickness from being on a boat.
play a role in nausea from motion sickness. They found ginger limited the release of vasopressin during “circular vection.” (Yes, there is a scientific term for sitting in a spinning chair.) The researchers also measured electrical activity in the stomach (tachygastria) during circular vection—and found ginger kept the activity “relatively stable” as compared to “chaotic” activity without the spice. “Ginger is effective in preventing motion sickness, possibly by suppressing vasopressin release from the central nervous system,” said the researchers. “Ginger may act as a novel agent in the prevention and treatment of motion sickness.”