Tongkat Ali for Stress Resilience
The clearest human signal for tongkat ali is cortisol reduction under stress.
Overview
Verdict
How It Works
Dosing & Protocol
Typical dose
- Recommended dose
- 200 mg/day of standardised water-based extract, taken in the morning with food
- Expected timeframe
- 4-8 weeks
Protocol
- form
- Standardised water-based extract such as Physta or LJ100
- duration
- 4-12 weeks
- co factor
- Take in the morning with food. Evidence is mixed. The key study is Talbott and colleagues, who randomised 63 moderately stressed adults to 200 mg/day of standardised extract or placebo for 4 weeks and found a 16% reduction in salivary cortisol, an 11% rise in testosterone, and improvements in tension, anger and confusion on the Profile of Mood States. This is a single small short trial with a plausible endocrine mechanism, not replicated independently, and salivary cortisol is a variable measure. Other tongkat ali trials have not examined stress endpoints, so the base is one study.
- titration
- Up to 400 mg/day, though the stress trial used 200 mg/day
- starting dose
- 200 mg/day of water-based extract standardised to eurycomanone, in the morning with food
Evidence
What the studies say
The effect of Tongkat Ali on stress hormones and psychological mood state in moderately stressed subjects
Talbott SM, Talbott JA, George A +1 more
Supplementation reduced salivary cortisol and improved tension, anger and confusion in moderately stressed adults
Effect of Tongkat Ali on stress hormones and psychological mood state in moderately stressed subjects
Talbott SM, Talbott JA, George A +1 more
Supplementation reduced salivary cortisol and improved tension, anger and confusion in moderately stressed adults
Safety
Caveats
One small unreplicated 4-week trial is a thin base for a stress claim, and salivary cortisol is notoriously variable, shifting with time of day, sleep, caffeine, exercise and food. The interventions that reliably reduce strain are workload management, sleep, physical activity, recovery time and social support, with CBT and mindfulness-based stress reduction having the strongest formal evidence. Safety of tongkat ali: generally well tolerated at 200-400 mg/day, but insomnia, restlessness and irritability are the reported effects - which cuts directly against the intended use, so dose in the morning and stop if sleep worsens. Lead contamination has been documented in a substantial proportion of commercial products in Malaysian market surveys, so use third-party tested standardised extracts only. It may lower blood glucose, relevant in diabetes, and may interact with antihypertensives. Avoid in hormone-sensitive cancers including prostate and breast cancer, and in prostate disease. Avoid in pregnancy and breastfeeding. Long-term safety beyond a few months is not established. Persistent exhaustion warrants assessment for anaemia, thyroid disease, sleep apnoea, diabetes and depression.
Less likely to help if
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