Mushrooms are an incredibly valuable and nutrient-dense food that provides our gut bacteria with unique types of fiber that we cannot get from any other food. But recent trends have also started to discuss the power of medicinal mushrooms, a sub-category of mushrooms that, in addition to being a nutrient-dense food, have known medical benefits.
Medicinal mushrooms have been used in traditional medicine for centuries. Unlike some other techniques and products in the alternative medical community, mushrooms are remarkably well studied and validated as having medical benefits.
You may have heard that medicinal mushrooms are great for our immune system, but did you know that they can also improve our blood sugar, help maintain a healthy cardiovascular system, and combat fatigue?
What are medicinal mushrooms
Mushrooms are the fruiting body of a fungus. They are a unique class of organisms that play an important role in all ecosystems, especially as contributors to the decomposition and recycling of plant and animal matter.
They are well studied for their unique compounds that contribute to this unique ability to digest other types of organisms.
Medicinal mushrooms are considered as such because they have been studied for their ability to improve or maintain health; current estimates are that there are approximately 700 species of mushrooms with medicinal properties.
That said, not all of these species have rigorous science to back them up (at least for now). There are several well-established medicinal mushroom species that have been used by traditional cultures, especially in Asia, but also in regions of Eastern Europe and Africa, and that have been well studied in the scientific literature. These include:
• Reishi (Ganoderma lucidum)
• Shiitake (Lentinus edodes)
• Chaga (Inonotus obliquus)
• Lion's mane (Hericium erinaceus)
• Turkey tail (Trametes versicolor)
• Cordyceps (Cordyceps sinensis)
Of course, this is just a small sample of the roughly 14,000 species of mushrooms (and an estimated 500,000 to 10 million species of mushrooms worldwide). So, the well-studied handful of mushrooms may just be the tip of the iceberg, medically.
Known physiological effects of medicinal mushrooms
There are many known physiological benefits of medicinal mushrooms. Here is a breakdown of all the established ways that medicinal mushrooms can influence our health:
Immune system
This may be the best-known mechanism behind the health effects of medicinal mushrooms, as there has been a lot of pressure on the antitumor and immunomodulatory effects. But that is not all. Several physiological actions have been identified as additional ways that these powerful fungi influence our immune function.
Antitumor
Polysaccharides in over 30 species of medicinal mushrooms have been shown to prevent tumor formation, exhibit direct antitumor activity, and prevent metastasis (spread of cancer from the original organ to another location / organ system).
Specifically, studies have shown that these effects are most powerful when combined with chemotherapy and, more importantly, it is safe to implement both at the same time. This activity is modulated by T cells, so a person must have an intact T cell system and thymus.
Immunomodulator
Components of medicinal mushrooms have been shown to induce gene expression leading to the creation of a variety of immunomodulatory cytokines and cytokine receptors.
This allows the immune system to respond appropriately to stressors and helps cushion inappropriate inflammation.
Elimination of antioxidants and radicals
Antioxidants and radical scavengers are compounds capable of neutralizing free radicals and oxidized compounds in the body. Antioxidants also work within the enzyme systems in the liver that are important for detoxification and elimination.
Compounds in medicinal mushrooms have been shown to have powerful antioxidant capacity, which undoubtedly contributes to their anti-tumor and anti-inflammatory qualities.
Antibacterial, antiparasitic and antifungal
Some studies are comparing the antimicrobial activity of medicinal mushrooms with that of pharmaceutical antibiotics. Current thinking is that mushrooms require their own antimicrobial properties to stay vital in nature, and humans who consume medicinal mushrooms reap some of those benefits.
Interestingly, studies now show that shiitake mushrooms can be an antimicrobial agent in cases of treatment-resistant and otherwise difficult infections such as shigella and E. coli O157: H7.

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