From BZ/dpa
Fruit is healthy and is part of a balanced diet. In some cases, however, fruits are assumed to have an effect that they simply do not have. An example: raspberries.
There are a number of nutritional tips online that are intended to make medication superfluous.
Raspberries, for example, are said to be up to three times more effective against headaches than aspirin. Is there something to it?
It’s about salicylic acid
Rating: Raspberries do contain salicylic acid, which has an analgesic effect. It is chemically closely related to the active ingredient in aspirin – acetylsalicylic acid.
But: In order to absorb a comparable amount of active ingredient as that of an aspirin tablet, you would have to eat an unrealistically large amount of raspberries.
Facts: Raspberries contain a relatively high amount of salicylic acid compared to other fruits. This has an analgesic and fever-reducing effect. As a rule, it is not used in its pure form, but in various chemical compounds of the substance.
How much salicylic acid is in raspberries
Scientific studies have examined the amount of salicylic acid in food. According to an Australian study from 1985, 100 grams of fresh raspberries contain 3.14 milligrams.
A more recent study, also from Australia, found a value of only 10.52 milligrams of salicylic acid per kilo for fresh raspberries – i.e. 1.05 milligrams per 100 grams.
The differences are due, among other things, to differences in the measurement methods. In other – differently serious – sources there is further information on the salicylic acid content of raspberries, about 5.14 milligrams per 100 grams.
A standard aspirin tablet contains 500 mg acetylsalicylic acid (ASA).
According to the manufacturer Bayer, it is suitable for the treatment of mild to moderately severe headaches. The effect of ASA is based on the fact that it inhibits certain enzymes in the body. This blocks the production of inflammation-boosting compounds. The inflammatory processes are stopped, we perceive less pain.
Specialists: Proposal is “unworldly”
And what do pain management experts say? Prof. Hartmut Göbel, chief physician at the pain clinic in Kiel, bases his answer on a content of around 5 milligrams of active ingredient per 100 grams of raspberries.
For aspirin, a proper dose for adults is 1,000 milligrams, he says. “So you would have to eat around 200 x 100 grams of raspberries to absorb the same amount of active ingredient.
That’s 20 kg of fruit. At 500 mg it is “only” 10 kg. So the proposal is unworldly.”
Prof. Daniel Pöpping from the Clinic for Anaesthesiology, Surgical Intensive Care Medicine and Pain Therapy at the University Hospital in Münster goes one step further.
There is no study on the successful treatment of headaches with raspberries in the PubMed medical database. “It’s ‘fake news’ as far as I can tell.”