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Questions & Answers
About Dr. Lee's TeaForHealth™
Green Teas
Preparation and Storage
Green Tea As Preventative Medicine
Anticancer Effects of Green Tea
About Other Teas
Submit your
own questions to Dr. Lee
- Why is Dr. Lee’s TeaForHealth™ different
from other green teas?
- Unlike any other brands of green tea that vary widely in antioxidant
potency and purity, Dr. Lee’s TeaForHealth™ is certified to meet
rigid standards. Dr. Lee and a tea research institute in China
have established these standards for the green tea. For more
information, read about the specifications for
Dr. Lee's TeaForHealth™ green tea.
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- What is the difference in health
benefits between the standard grade and the deluxe grade of Dr. Lee’s
TeaForHealth™?
- Based on the green tea catechin (GTC) contents, there is no significant
difference between the two. The deluxe grade tea may contain more theanine and other substances that give the tea its pleasant aroma, and
it may contain a slightly higher level of (-)epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG), because it is composed of all
young tea buds and the two adjacent first leaves. It is well known that
young tea leaves contain more EGCG than older leaves. For the
purpose of health protection, both grades have comparable levels of
antioxidants. To enjoy the aroma of the deluxe green tea, use 4-5
grams of
dry tea leaves per OX™ tea steeper. The aroma is
at its best when the
tea is light and not over-steeped. One drinks the standard grade of green
tea, but sips the deluxe tea - an experience appreciated
only by seasoned tea
drinkers. ↑top
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- Why is the deluxe grade of Dr. Lee’s
TeaForHealth™ several times more expensive than the standard grade?
- The prices of green teas range from a few U.S.
dollars per pound in a supermarket to several hundred U.S. dollars per pound
in some gourmet tea stores. The deluxe grade
of Dr. Lee’s TeaForHealth™
is composed of young buds and the two first leaves next to these buds. They are hand-plucked and hand-processed to avoid breaking the tender
buds and leaves into pieces. One skilled tea worker harvests about 600
grams of live young tea leaves per day by hand. After pan-frying by hand in
small aliquot at no more than 150 grams per batch, the final yield from
this 600 grams of fresh young leaves is about 120 grams of deluxe dry green
tea. Its production is highly labor-intensive. The yield of the
deluxe
tea is low and the demand is high. Also, in order to preserve the
fragrant aroma, all deluxe tea is expeditiously transported by air freight and
stored in freezers until final shipment to the tea connoisseur. The standard
grade of green tea is harvested and processed by semi-mechanized
methods, shipped by ocean freight, and stored in a cool warehouse. Both
grades of TeaForHealth™ contain about 15% GTC and 9-11% EGCG in dry
weight when freshly vacuum-packed. Even after 2 years of storage, the
GTC and EGCG contents are at least 10% and 7%,
respectively. ↑top
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- Why would green tea degrade during storage?
- The antioxidant polyphenols in green tea leaves are
chemically active electron donors. All green teas eventually lose their
antioxidant activities during storage, because the simple polyphenol
molecules react among themselves to polymerize even in the absence
of oxygen although at a slower rate. TeaForHealth™ is a high potency
green tea in which the EGCG level is between 9% and 11% at the time of
packaging. However, degradation will takes place, like in any other
green tea. Dr. Lee's TeaForHealth™ has a
free exchange policy to ensure
that all customers maximize the health benefits of drinking high potency
green tea. If the sealed outer package is unopened, the standard grade
of Dr. Lee’s TeaForHealth™ can be returned and exchanged for a package
of new tea free of charge after the expiration date. Deluxe teas
may not be exchanged. ↑top
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- What is the benefit of using Dr.Lee’s OX™ tea
steeper to brew green tea?
- The OX™ tea steeper is made using
lead-free glaze and its leachable lead and cadmium levels are well below the
allowable limits set by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for
ceramic mugs and cups. Tests are conducted and certified by an independent U.S.
laboratory using
FDA-approved method for analysis. It is important to use a lead-free
steeper to brew tea so that no excess heavy metals are inadvertently
introduced into our bodies. Using the oxygen exclusion
OX™ tea steeper
to brew tea will preserve 15-20% more antioxidants in the tea extract. The molecules of tea antioxidants have loosely attached electrons, which
are readily transferred to the atmospheric oxygen molecules at high
temperature thus decreasing their antioxidative activity. Serious cancer
researchers extract the dry tea leaves in hot water under nitrogen to
prevent oxidation of the tea catechins when they prepare the tea for
animal studies. It is not practical or cost effective to do this everyday at home. Therefore, to maximize the health benefits of drinking green tea, it is
advisable to brew tea under anaerobic conditions. This means minimal
exposure to air, which is exactly how the OX™ tea steeper is designed
to brew tea. ↑top
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- What is the appropriate dose of Dr.
Lee’s TeaForHealth™ to be used per tea steeper?
- For a healthy person drinking green tea as a
soothing beverage and for chemoprevention of diseases, 3-4 grams of
Dr.
Lee’s TeaForHealth™ per steeper three times a day is an adequate dose.
When prepared properly, it will deliver about 1000 mg total GTCs,
including about 700 mg EGCG, to the human body per day. However, for
therapeutic purposes, a higher dose may be needed (see the article titled
"Drinking Green Tea to Boost Chemotherapy in the Fight Against Cancer").
For Dr. Lee’s 45-pound dog, who previously suffered from multicentric canine
lymphoma, a daily dose of 10-12 grams of dry green tea leaves, brewed in
one tea steeper and diluted to a final volume of 500 ml, has proved to
be effective in maintaining the remission of the cancer and is well
tolerated by the dog. This exact concentration of green tea is commonly
used among green tea drinkers in the Chinese community. However, to
some people it may cause gastric irritation if consumed when there is no
food in the stomach. You must consult your physician to adjust the
appropriate dose in your case if you want to use green tea as a
therapeutic supplement for an established disease, such as cancer.
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- Can I add sugar, honey, cream or lemon
juice to my green tea?
- Yes. You may put sugar, honey, cream and lemon
juice into the tea extract shortly before drinking. A short exposure to
these additives at cold and room temperature will not significantly
destroy the GTCs. However, a prolonged exposure to acid, sugar and
alkaline when the tea is still hot will cause varying degrees of
degradation. Added milk products to tea have been reported to abolish
the insulin-boosting activity of green tea in the laboratory.
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- Can I prepare my green tea once a day
for convenience?
- Yes. You may brew 9-12 grams of dry tea leaves (about
three heaping teaspoons) in a steeper for 20 minutes. As soon as the
brewing time of 20 minutes is up, pour the hot liquid tea extract over
about 80-100 ml of ice for immediate cooling. Keep the iced tea in a
plastic or a glass bottle with an air-tight cap. Keep the tea
refrigerated and consume it within 24 hours. The liquid tea may turn
milky in the cold. Don’t worry about this change in appearance. Don’t
try to reheat the cold tea before drinking. Stored green tea always
becomes slightly bitter. ↑top
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- What are the benefits of drinking green
tea?
- Please read the Home Page and the Science and Art of Tea For Health
on www.teaforhealth.com.
Most likely, you will be able to find answers to your questions there.
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- What is known about the active
ingredients in the green tea that are beneficial for health promotion?
- Most scientific research indicates that the GTCs, especially EGCG, act as
potent antioxidants and that a tea amino acid, theanine, acts as a
biochemical modulator. These are the primary substances that have been
identified as being responsible for the health benefits of drinking
green tea. However, there may be other beneficial components in green
tea that have not yet been identified. For this reason, taking pills or
capsules of the chemicals, EGCG and theanine, should not be considered
to be a suitable substitute for drinking green tea in health promotion.
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- Since green tea will give me such great
health benefits, do I have to be bothered with regular check-ups by my
doctor?
- Yes. You should inform your doctor that you are a
regular green tea drinker. Tea is an herbal beverage with certain
pharmacological effects on the human body. Your doctor should know that
you are drinking green tea as a dietary supplement. Green tea contains a
low level of caffeine, may cause allergic reactions in some patients,
and may interact with warfarin.
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- What is the role of my doctor if I
have to make my own decision when I have a health problem?
- If you are an educated consumer, your doctor will
act as your consultant to direct you to make the right decision, which
may be difficult to make and may not be a perfect one. If you need
surgery, your doctor is the only one who can help. One can compare our
current electronic information age with the historical period when
movable type technology was first introduced to Europe for mass-printing
the Bible for its wide distribution in the 15th century. Both of these
two technological advancements resulted in breaking down the monopoly of
knowledge by a small group of people. One took the knowledge and
wisdom written in the Bible from the hands of the priests and passed
them to the public, yet priests still function as spiritual leaders and
counselors. Now, an educated consumer can find useful information
related to specific health issues on the Internet, which may not have
been included in the standard medical textbooks and remains unknown to
the doctors. The role of a good doctor in this case has become that of a
medical consultant to guide an educated patient in how to use the
information available. An educated patient may ask the treating doctor
how to use the information recently published on green tea research to
benefit his or her health. ↑top
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- If so much scientific research has been
done and has provided positive evidence for the health benefits of
drinking green tea with little associated toxicity to humans, why don’t
more doctors recommend tea drinking to their patients as a preventive or
therapeutic medication?
- Green tea cannot be classified as a medication to
be recommended or prescribed by traditional medical doctors for the
treatment or prevention of human diseases. Since it is not a drug no
pharmaceutical company will perform clinical trials in humans using
green tea as an active agent. If no sponsor submits a new drug
application to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), claiming green
tea as an active substance, the FDA will not consider or classify it as
a drug. As a result, doctors cannot prescribe it to their patients, even
though they may drink green tea to promote their own health, or they may
even use it as a medication for themselves. The potential malpractice
litigation prevents medical doctors in the US from prescribing any
medications or supplementary agents that are not included in the
Physicians’ Desk References® (PDR) for the treatment of their patients,
or prescribing an FDA-approved drug to treat a disease that is not
listed as an “indication” for the drug in the PDR. Simply put, green tea
is not an FDA-approved medication.
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- Can I depend on drinking green tea as my
fountain of youth or a vehicle to human immortality?
- No. Death is programmed in our genes. Even drinking
a large amount of green tea regularly will not avoid death. Most of us
will die of heart attack, stroke or cancer. The slogan “to eliminate
cancer” is useful in raising money for cancer research, but cannot be a
goal for our work. If we can find better ways to delay the occurrence of
fatal diseases, such as cancer, in our lives and to reduce the suffering
when we must deal with a fatal disease, we should be satisfied and feel
happy. For maintaining your good health, you must eat a balanced diet,
including the intake of other proper dietary supplements, such as
vitamins, and exercise your body and mind.
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- There are so many herbs and dietary
supplements on the market, all claimed by the vendors to be beneficial
to health. How do I know whom to believe?
- First ask if the herbs or dietary supplements have
been tested in laboratories, using modern biochemical and cell biology
techniques to prove the potential safety and efficacy as claimed. Ask if
the claims are supported by published biochemical and molecular data,
and if they can be explained in terms of sound scientific language
according to the current understanding of biochemistry and cell biology.
Ask if there are experimental animal models, epidemiologic data and
prior human consumption to prove the claims of safety and efficacy. Try
to read the original scientific publications that are supportive of the
claims, if possible. Finally, ask your consultant, the family doctor, to
help you with the interpretation. But in the end, you have to make your
own decision. ↑top
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- Do you mean I cannot depend on my
doctors, the pharmaceutical industry and the FDA to give me the best
advice to manage my health?
- Not completely. We are living in an age of
information explosion. Mr. Joseph A. Zaccagnino, president and CEO of
Yale-New Haven Hospital, was quoted in New Haven Register (August 4,
2002), as saying, "Consumers are eager for information for managing their
own health. Any way we can educate the public is important for us.” This
may be the most realistic summary of the doctor-patient relationship
today and for the foreseeable future. Most decisions on how to treat a
serious disease are jointly made by doctor and patient after
evidence-based informed counseling. The function of physicians and
hospitals now is to provide information to patients and consumers so
that they may better manage their own health. The consumers and patients
must eventually decide what to buy.
New research data are published everyday from all
over the world. Some are useful, but most are not relevant to our daily
life. The practicing medical doctors cannot possibly read, understand
and digest all new research publications, because the frontiers of
scientific and medical research have expanded so rapidly and so widely.
In our society, medicine has become part of a health industry, i.e., a
business. The issue of potential malpractice lawsuits alone would
prevent the doctor from passing to patients any new information not
listed as accepted standard treatment. The pharmaceutical companies and
the FDA are not responsible for recommending the best modality of
treatment for any human disease. Patients have become consumers who must
gather as much useful information as possible to make an informed
decision on their health with the doctor acting as a consultant.
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- How can drinking green tea help me?
There is a cancer history in my family.
- First of all, drinking green tea may prevent or delay the
inevitable occurrence of cancer. We probably will all develop cancer if we
live long enough. A cancer history in your family does not make you more
abnormal than the next person. Statistical studies have shown that women who consume a high volume of green tea regularly enjoy an average
of 8.7 more cancer-free years in their lives compared to low-volume tea
drinkers. Secondly, green tea has been proven to be highly effective in
suppressing the growth of practically all human cancer cells tested in
the laboratory and in animals transplanted with human cancers.
Laboratory and animal research has proved that green tea or its
components enhance the anticancer effects of the chemotherapeutic drugs
that are prescribed by medical doctors to control spreading cancers
in human patients. Therefore, in a case of spreading cancer that is no
longer surgically resectable, the patient may ask the doctor to consider
treating the cancer with green tea in combination with “non-toxic
drugs”, for example, corticosteroids and an anticancer quinolone
antibiotic, or using green tea in combination with the standard “toxic”
chemotherapeutic drugs in order to enhance the anticancer effects and to
reduce the undesirable complications of the latter. Read the article
titled "Drinking Green Tea to Boost Chemotherapy in the Fight Against
Cancer" published on this website and consult your doctor.
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- Why doesn’t the pharmaceutical industry
do clinical trials on green tea, for example, as a supplementary
medication to combat human cancer?
- Green tea is a relatively inexpensive herbal
beverage with medicinal effects. No company can monopolize the marketing
of green tea. Therefore, there is no financial incentive for
pharmaceutical businesses to do any randomized, unbiased, double-blind,
placebo-controlled clinical studies on tea in human patients. It takes
more than $600 million for the pharmaceutical industry to bring one
single new drug from the research bench to the market. No pharmaceutical
company will develop a new drug without patent protection. It is obvious
that green tea cannot be patented.
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- I am a patient suffering from cancer, can I use
green tea or green tea plus a quinolone antibiotic as a non-toxic
regimen, such as ciprofloxacin, to treat my cancer as described for Dr.
Lee’s dog?
- Although green tea and ciprofloxacin have been
shown in laboratory tests and in animal models to be effective against
various human cancer cells, no pharmaceutical company has tested this
combination for the treatment of human cancers that occur spontaneously.
You may consult your doctor on this question after reading the
scientific articles published in this website. Although quinolones are
approved drugs widely used for controlling urinary infections, it is
unlikely that any practicing physicians in the U.S. would prescribe green tea
with ciprofloxacin for the treatment of human cancers because of the
malpractice issues involved. However, your doctor may accept your idea
of drinking green tea as an adjunct to boost the anticancer effects of
certain chemotherapeutic agents. If you are interested in more details
on this subject, you may write to Fleminger, Inc. We will refer your
questions to our medical consultants, who may be able to help you in
this matter. ↑top
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- I have just been diagnosed as having
inoperable cancer and I do not want to receive chemotherapy if I can
help it. Can I drink green tea to control my cancer?
- You are facing a very serious issue in your life.
Don’t make a hasty decision. First educate yourself by reading the
references cited in this website and then consult your doctor on the
following questions.
(1) How long does he expect you to live if you do not
receive chemotherapy? Ask him to show you the references to support his
evaluation based on the experience of other patients with the same
pathology diagnosis (histological type, the cancer grade, size of the
tumor, etc.) and the same clinical cancer staging as yours.
(2) How many more months or years will the
chemotherapy add to your remaining life compared to “no treatment”? Ask
him to show you the references to support his evaluation.
(3) What are the potential life-threatening and
non-life-threatening complications (short-term and long-term) that may
be caused by the chemotherapy prescribed? Ask him to show you the
references.
(4) What is the chance that you may
develop potentially life-threatening and non-life-threatening
complications that are associated with or caused by the chemotherapy
prescribed? Ask him to show you the references.
(5) What is the long-term survival probability if you
were to start the chemotherapy on the day when the pathology diagnosis
of cancer was made, compared to that if you were to receive the
chemotherapy a month or two later? Is there any significant
difference? Ask him to show you the references.
(6) Will your doctor be sympathetic if you want to try
a “non-toxic drug” regimen to treat your cancer for two months to
determine if it works in your case provided there is no clear evidence
that a delay in starting chemotherapy for two months would jeopardize or
shorten your life because of the delay?
(7) Ask your doctor about the potential harmful
effects in your case if you were to drink the extracts of 30-45 grams of
dry green tea leaves daily in combination with prednisone for a few days
and a quinolone antibiotic, such as ciprofloxacin (1500 mg per day) for
two months. The side effects of green tea and those of the two
FDA-approved drugs, prednisone and quinolone antibiotics, are well known
and are considered to be negligible when compared to those of
chemotherapeutic agents for cancer unless you have a special health
condition.
(8) Based on the above information, you must make the final decision
about what you want to do with the help of your physician. ↑top
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- I have been on chemotherapy for an unresectable
cancer. In what way can drinking green tea help me?
- The active components of green tea have been found
to enhance the cytotoxic activity of many standard chemotherapeutic
drugs, among them 5-fluorouracil and doxorubicin, against cancer cells
by as much as 45-fold in the laboratory. Drinking a few cups of green
tea easily raises the concentration of tea catechins in the human
serum to an effective level. Based on these and other encouraging
research data, some clinical oncologists have already proposed the addition
of these active tea ingredients to the current anticancer therapeutic
regimens to increase the efficacy of these therapies. Because tea is a
relatively inexpensive natural product and is nontoxic, it might be
possible to administer it alone or as an adjunct to chemotherapy for a
relatively long period of time without adverse side effects.*
For more information, please read the article published on this website
titled "Drinking Green Tea to Boost Chemotherapy in the Fight
against Cancer" and consult your doctor.
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- * M. Masuda, M. Suzui and I .B. Weinstein of Herbert Irving
Comprehensive Cancer Center, Columbia University, College of Physicians
and Surgeons, New York, NY (a report published in Clinical Cancer
Research Vol. 7, 4220-4229, December 2001).
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- I am a cancer patient under chemotherapy. My
oncologist told me to stop drinking green tea because it might interfere with
chemotherapy. What should I do?
- In the tea library (Green Tea in the Fight Against Cancer), we have cited
scientific publications showing that green tea may enhance the anticancer
activities of certain chemotherapeutic agents, notably the DNA topoisomerase
inhibitors (for example, doxorubicin) and 5-fluorouracil. Green tea may reduce
the side effects of the chemotherapeutic drugs. However, some oncologists in the past were concerned about the
possibility that antioxidant vitamin supplements, such as vitamin C and E, and
green tea antioxidants, might protect the human cells, including cancer cells,
from the cytotoxicity of the chemotherapeutic drugs and therefore might decrease
the effectiveness of the drugs they prescribed for the patients.
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- This
theoretical concern was not based on clinical facts. To the contrary, good
nutrition, including taking antioxidant vitamin supplements, has been found to
benefit the patients undergoing chemotherapy by reducing the adverse effects of
the standard chemotherapeutic drugs. A more recent report is published in the
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2004;79:1029-1036, by Kennedy DD and
colleagues from the Division of Pediatric Oncology, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University, New York. The report is titled “Low
antioxidant vitamin intakes are associated with increase in adverse effects of
chemotherapy in children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia”. You may view the
abstract of this article by conducting a PubMed search. Please consult your oncologist again and ask
for publications that contradict the data presented in this report for an
evidence-based counseling between doctor and patient. I am sure you and your
doctor will reach the most appropriate decision for your health care.
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- What is "White Tea"?
Correct the misconception and find the truth.
- The term “white tea” first appeared in a book titled A Grand
Overview on Tea authored by a Chinese emperor Song Hui Zhong (Zhao
Ji) in 1107A.D. Emperor Hui Zhong wrote “..white tea is a rare
species of tea tree, different from the rest. Its branches are delicate
and its leaves are thin and translucent. It is found occasionally
between rocks and cannot be cultivated. …Therefore, it is the most
precious of teas…” This description is consistent with a rare
mutant of weak tea trees incapable of producing the normal amount of
chlorophylls and unable to reproduce. In the history of China, few
people have ever tasted the white tea described by the emperor.
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- Nowadays, “white tea” refers to a product consisting of intact young
tea leaves with no heat treatment and with little manipulation after
harvest to preserve the natural layer of white fine hairs (down)
covering the surface of the fresh young tea leaves. The fresh tea
leaves used to make white teas are first dried directly under the sun or
at a temperature 28-30ºC with a 65-70 % relative humidity until the
water contents of tea leaves are reduced to 14-16% in weight. This
process takes about 34-38 hours and allows the tea leaves to wither
without intentional mechanical damage, which is needed for the
production of green tea and black tea. Then the withered tea
leaves will be further dried at higher temperatures for storage. Some
people like the “withered-grassy” aroma of the white teas. Since
the natural polyphenol oxidases in the white teas have not been
heat-inactivated, enzymatic oxidation of the tea catechins continues
during the natural withering process and during storage.
Therefore, the shelf life of white teas is very short. The
contents of the tea antioxidants and other bioactive ingredients in the
white teas have not been studied.
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