Devasya Narayana Sharma

Plants have been an important source for developing drugs since time immemorial. Various medicinal herbs are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent and Asparagus is one such plant. Asparagus racemosus Willd., more commonly known as Shatavari, has been traditionally used in many systems of medicine such as Ayurveda, Unani and Siddha. It has been used for decades as a galactogogue, uterine tonic, adaptogen, and rejuvenator. Also it has been used to mitigate symptoms of peptic ulcer, as an immunostimulant, hepatoprotective, and aphrodisiac. In addition, several other health benefits of this wonder plant, such as antidepressant, antiamnesic, antianxiety, hypolipidemic, antidiabetic, and anticonvulsant effects have been discovered in the recent years. In this article, an effort has been made to comprehensively enumerate all the health benefits of A. racemosus, known so far.