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Saw Palmetto or Serenoa Repens also goes by the name of palmetto scrub or cabbage palm and grows indigenously in the S.E. United States and the islands in the West Indies with Florida as the main supplier.

Despite its numerous names saw palmetto is best described as a palm shrub and seems to thrive in colonies of a 100 plus plants each producing 3 to 7 fan-shaped leaves which can grow up to two feet in width. Spring sees the emergence of small white flowers later to become berries, the fruit of the saw palmetto.

Saw Palmetto Plant

Berries of the Saw Palmetto Plant

These berries were one of the staple foods of the Native Americans in that area, and were also taken for their medicinal properties for treatment of impotence, inflammation and infertility to name but a few. Interestingly, pumpkin seeds and nettle root were also mixed with the berries by the “Medicine Men” of that era.

By the late nineteenth century saw palmetto was being used to treat enlarged prostate, cystitis and gonorrhea; but its use gradually declined in the states after World War11 with the baton being taken up in Europe as a medicinal herb. Germany is seen by many as the forerunners of BPH treatments using saw palmetto insisting that the extract must contain between 85-95% fatty acids and sterols to be effective.

So how does it work? Briefly, the over-production of dihydrotestosterone (DHT) is the main reason for prostate enlargement as men get older; and the free fatty acids and sterols found in the saw palmetto extract reduce the amount of DHT created by the body.