My main problem with elderberry is that I can’t reconcile the recommendations about dosage, even from one single source. Looking at the two main published studies and the labels on commercially available products, I can’t make sense of the dosage units and procedure. Chris Masterjohn recommends something like 1000 mg of elderberry extract daily, split in two doses. However, the studies cited to support this dosage make use of Sambucol, which advertises 38% concentration (or 1.83g per 5 ml dose). So, how many millilitres daily would be required? The dosage recommended on the product’s label is the exact same as the dosage used in the studies: 15ml of Sambucol syrup four times per day. But this amounts to 3*4*1.83g/day or 22g. That’s 22 times the dosage (1000mg daily) recommended by Masterjohn. (It’s also 22 times costlier!). What gives?
This might be about the difference between elderberry and “elderberry extract”? [1] confirms that Sambucol contains 3.8g elderberry per 10ml, as you say. I wish it were more descriptive. [2] says Elderberrys are 80% water, bringing us down to 4.5g of whatever’s left over. I could believe that “elderberry extract” is only about 20% again of that? Though my first guess would have been that the extract is just “elderberries with the water taken out”.
Looking up the references for human trials, Chris offers [3] and [4]. [3] doesn’t seem to be open access and there’s nothing helpful in the abstract. Glancing at [4], it’s not about Sambucol but they did seem to use ~1g of elderberry extract. I also ran into [5] which Chris doesn’t cite but seems relevant since it’s actually about Sambucol, but the dose isn’t in the abstract. (It says free full text but I couldn’t find it with a few seconds of clicking, I think maybe I’d need to create an account.)
So my tentative guess would be that Sambucol just has a lot less “elderberry extract” than the 38% concentration makes it sound like; so that if you’re taking that you’d want to take the recommended dose, to get the equivalent of ~1000mg “elderberry extract” from other sources.
My main problem with elderberry is that I can’t reconcile the recommendations about dosage, even from one single source. Looking at the two main published studies and the labels on commercially available products, I can’t make sense of the dosage units and procedure. Chris Masterjohn recommends something like 1000 mg of elderberry extract daily, split in two doses. However, the studies cited to support this dosage make use of Sambucol, which advertises 38% concentration (or 1.83g per 5 ml dose). So, how many millilitres daily would be required? The dosage recommended on the product’s label is the exact same as the dosage used in the studies: 15ml of Sambucol syrup four times per day. But this amounts to 3*4*1.83g/day or 22g. That’s 22 times the dosage (1000mg daily) recommended by Masterjohn. (It’s also 22 times costlier!). What gives?
Good question, and thanks for looking into it!
This might be about the difference between elderberry and “elderberry extract”? [1] confirms that Sambucol contains 3.8g elderberry per 10ml, as you say. I wish it were more descriptive. [2] says Elderberrys are 80% water, bringing us down to 4.5g of whatever’s left over. I could believe that “elderberry extract” is only about 20% again of that? Though my first guess would have been that the extract is just “elderberries with the water taken out”.
Looking up the references for human trials, Chris offers [3] and [4]. [3] doesn’t seem to be open access and there’s nothing helpful in the abstract. Glancing at [4], it’s not about Sambucol but they did seem to use ~1g of elderberry extract. I also ran into [5] which Chris doesn’t cite but seems relevant since it’s actually about Sambucol, but the dose isn’t in the abstract. (It says free full text but I couldn’t find it with a few seconds of clicking, I think maybe I’d need to create an account.)
So my tentative guess would be that Sambucol just has a lot less “elderberry extract” than the 38% concentration makes it sound like; so that if you’re taking that you’d want to take the recommended dose, to get the equivalent of ~1000mg “elderberry extract” from other sources.
[1] https://sambucol.co.uk/product/sambucol-original/
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambucus
[3] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24409980
[4] https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/8/4/182/htm
[5] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11399518