Abstract: Anxiety is an unavoidable part of life and we will experience it at some point. It is a totally normal emotion. Normal anxiety can happen when faced with an important decision to make, it quickly comes and goes. An anxiety disorder however, is much more serious as the nervous feelings remain constant and can interfere with a person’s ability to lead a normal life. There are many potential triggers for an anxiety disorder to develop and one being the menopause. As Cimicfuga racemosa is already associated with reducing hot flashes and it may also be a potential treatment for menopausal anxiety disorders. Introduction: Cimicfuga racemosa or black cohosh is currently associated as having a beneficial effect in reducing the occurrence of hot flashes in people suffering from breast cancer. However, …show more content…
The authors of this paper concentrated their efforts on investigating if a black cohosh extract could alleviate the symptoms of anxiety being caused by menopause. The purpose of the trial was to assess the “efficacy” and “tolerability” of black cohosh, with the authors hypothesising that black cohosh would surpass the placebo in reducing anxiety caused by the menopause. This particular study had a relatively low number of participants with 34 being enrolled initially to take part in the trial. Of those 34 people, 6 patients withdrew their consent to engage in the study before the trial got underway. The remaining 28 patients were then randomised into two groups, 15 being placed into the black cohosh group and 13 into the placebo group. During the trial 1 patient from each treatment group withdrew their consent to participate in the trial. Also 2 patients in each treatment group were lost during the trial and contact could not be re-established with them. Finally 1 patient had to leave the study due to “adverse