Ashwagandha · Withania · Hyderabad
The stress talk reprinted a smaller score.
A Hyderabad stress talk handed them a root capsule twice a day. Day 60 reprinted the PSS 9.1 points smaller.
A Hyderabad stress talk handed them a root capsule twice a day, then day 60 reprinted the PSS 9.1 points smaller on the arm that swallowed the root.
A supermarket bottle sat next to the vitamins while a reel called the same root a hormone stabilizer you could buy on the way home.
Cheap gummies sat next to the vitamin aisle
The aisle sold a feeling. Asha printed a sheet.
On 15 August 2026, r/Supplements put up "Ashwagandha is insane" and the thread sat at 547 points with 150 comments by the time last30days counted it.
Cheap gummies did nothing.
The writer had already switched bottles, and the second brand quieted the loops enough that a comment with 236 upvotes said the brand switch mattered more than the label because cheap gummies were sugar with a stamp.
Another comment told people to cycle the dose so the flat feeling stayed off, which is a year-long complaint this 60-day sheet never measured.
YouTube already sells both sides of that bottle. A clip titled "The DARK SIDE of Ashwagandha" sits at 1,241,919 views, and Good Morning America put the TikTok trend at 1,085,765.
On 7 August 2026 an X thread told 1,497,152 viewers that a daily root cuts cortisol 25 to 30 percent, which is a rounded caption sitting next to the Hyderabad sheet that printed 27.9 percent on the root arm. I wanted that sheet.
The talk was the door into Asha
They enrolled after a lecture, not after a shop click.
Chandrasekhar's Asha Hospital group printed the root in Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine, volume 34, issue 3, pages 255 to 262, DOI 10.4103/0253-7176.106022, after a 60-day double-blind room in Banjara Hills.
Asha Hospital sits on Road Number 14 in Banjara Hills in Hyderabad, and the work ran under ICMR-GCP and the 2008 Helsinki text after the hospital committee signed.
They started with a stress-management talk where doctors sat next to IT staff, then volunteers who scored 15 or lower on the WHO-5 well-being index and at least 14 on the PSS walked to the research desk.
Age sat between 18 and 54.
A psychiatrist cleared primary psychiatric illness before morning serum cortisol was drawn on day 0, and 64 people enrolled with 32 in each arm, 41 of them men and 23 of them women.
Young room.
Ashwagandha mean age sat at 25.8 with a spread of 6.7, while placebo mean age sat at 29.7 with a spread of 7.9, and WHO-5 started at 10.8 on the root arm against 9.8 on placebo.
They swallowed one capsule twice a day after food, with a glass of water, for the full 60 days.
The root capsule held 300 mg of a high-concentration full-spectrum extract drawn only from Withania somnifera roots, standardized to at least 5 percent withanolides by HPLC, which Ixoreal Biomed in Hyderabad supplied as KSM-66.
Leaves stayed out of the bottle.
Placebo capsules matched the size. A phone check landed on day 15, and the later calls repeated that check.
Two people left the root arm and one left placebo, so efficacy used 61 who stayed, 30 on the root and 31 on placebo, while safety used all 64 who took at least one capsule.
The printed conflict line said none and source of support printed nil, yet the extract still came from the company that sells that brand. I am leaving that on the table.
The PSS lost 9.1 on the root arm
Placebo kept almost the whole starting number.
The PSS sums ten items, each scored 0 to 4, into a 0 to 40 sheet where zero means the events barely showed.
Day 0 already split.
Root arm 20.6, spread 4.8, against placebo 24.6, spread 6.7, a gap that printed p = 0.0094, so the quieter start sat on the capsule side before the first swallow.
I am not hiding that.
Day 60 put the root arm at 11.5, spread 6.2, while placebo sat at 23.3, spread 7.2, for a change from baseline of -9.1, spread 8.6, against -1.4, spread 5.3, which is -44.0 percent against -5.5, with between-group p under 0.0001.
The starting gap stayed visible, and the drop still landed on the root arm.
The morning draw dropped 4.4
Placebo dropped 1.2.
Morning serum cortisol is measured in micrograms per deciliter, and the root arm moved from 15.7, spread 3.2, to 11.3, spread 3.7, a change of -4.4, spread 4.3, which is -27.9 percent.
Placebo moved from 15.6, spread 3.3, to 14.4, spread 3.2, a change of -1.2, spread 3.9, which is -7.9 percent, with day 60 p = 0.0006, change p = 0.002, and baseline p = 0.9011, so this draw started even.
The reel that rounded 25 to 30 percent was fishing next to a real 27.9.
Six mild events sat on the root arm against five on placebo, including one nasal congestion and one sleepy report, and no serious event printed.
The authors named the holes. The sample established the p values and still stayed a small room, and nobody on the sheet carried a psychiatric diagnosis or a systemic illness, so sixty days is not a year of gummies.
I keep the other adaptogen files in the Library.
The quieter reprint sat on the root arm.
If you came here for ashwagandha, Asha measured a 300 mg root capsule twice a day against a matched dummy, then reprinted the PSS on day 60.
Swallow that dose after food if you want that sheet.
Write the starting PSS if you want a clock, because a supermarket gummy and a 60-day root extract are a different bottle.
This page is about the stress talk that reprinted a smaller score, so run Protocol 01 first if you want a short daily count.
The 60-day sheet still owes you
Why was placebo's starting PSS higher?
The day 0 split printed p = 0.0094, root 20.6 against placebo 24.6, and the drop still beat placebo on change with p under 0.0001, so the uneven start stays on the page.
Did they pour leaves into the capsule?
Roots only.
The methods say no other plant parts, and the HPLC floor was 5 percent withanolides.
The paper ran 60 days. What about a year of gummies?
This file stops at day 60, even though a 2026 r/Supplements thread named a flat, bored year on a daily bottle that this sheet never watched.
Who paid?
The journal line printed source of support nil and conflict none, and Ixoreal still supplied KSM-66.
What if nightshades already bother me?
The discussion contraindicates people allergic to the Solanaceae family.
The Hyderabad numbers
Chandrasekhar K. with Kapoor J. and Anishetty S. "A Prospective, Randomized Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study of Safety and Efficacy of a High-Concentration Full-Spectrum Extract of Ashwagandha Root in Reducing Stress and Anxiety in Adults." Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine 2012, 34(3), 255 to 262. DOI 10.4103/0253-7176.106022. PMID 23439798. PMC 3573577. Asha Hospital, Department of Neuropsychiatry and Geriatric Psychiatry, Road No. 14, 298, Banjara Hills, Hyderabad 500 034. Ashwins Health Care and Research Centre. Single-center prospective double-blind randomized placebo-controlled trial. ICMR-GCP and Declaration of Helsinki 2008. Institutional review committee at Asha Hospital. Extract: KSM-66, Ixoreal Biomed, Hyderabad, roots only, HPLC withanolides at least 5 percent, green-chemistry process without alcohol or synthetic solvents. Enrolled n=64, 32 per arm, 41 men (64 percent), 23 women (36 percent). Efficacy n=61 (30 root, 31 placebo) after 2 root and 1 placebo lost to follow-up. Safety intent-to-treat n=64. Age 18 to 54. Inclusion WHO-5 well-being index 15 or lower, PSS at least 14, English read/write, no primary psychiatric illness besides stress. Exclusion chronic physical illness or a psychiatric file, certain hormonal birth control, regular medication, other adaptogen herbs, pregnant or lactating, substance dependence, abnormal lab or ECG. Dose 300 mg capsule twice daily after food with water for 60 days. Phone checks on day 15 and day 30. Day 45 repeated the call. Final assessments day 60. Morning serum cortisol. Table 1 enrolled: root age 25.8 SD 6.7, weight 66.1 SD 16.1, WHO-5 10.8 SD 3.0, pulse 72.4 SD 4.0, systolic 120.7 SD 6.0, diastolic 79.5 SD 2.7, male 21 (65.6 percent), female 11 (34.4 percent). Placebo age 29.7 SD 7.9, weight 64.9 SD 11.8, WHO-5 9.8 SD 4.0, pulse 73.4 SD 4.9, systolic 122.0 SD 6.1, diastolic 78.4 SD 4.2, male 20 (62.5 percent), female 12 (37.5 percent). Table 2 PSS (n=30 / n=31): baseline 20.6 SD 4.8 vs 24.6 SD 6.7, p=0.0094. Day 60 11.5 SD 6.2 vs 23.3 SD 7.2, p under 0.0001. Change -9.1 SD 8.6 vs -1.4 SD 5.3, p under 0.0001. Percent -44.0 vs -5.5. Table 3 GHQ-28 total: day 0 34.0 SD 14.1 vs 31.5 SD 15.0, p=0.4977. Day 60 9.4 SD 9.5 vs 30.8 SD 20.5, p under 0.0001. Change -24.6 SD 14.8 vs -0.7 SD 14.9, p under 0.0001. Percent -72.3 vs -2.3. Table 4 DASS total: baseline 54.8 SD 22.8 vs 54.9 SD 28.2, p=0.9954. Day 60 15.6 SD 18.0 vs 52.1 SD 37.0, p under 0.0001. Change -39.3 SD 29.9 vs -2.8 SD 25.4, p under 0.0001. Percent -71.6 vs -5.0. Table 5 serum cortisol ug/dL: baseline 15.7 SD 3.2 vs 15.6 SD 3.3, p=0.9011. Day 60 11.3 SD 3.7 vs 14.4 SD 3.2, p=0.0006. Change -4.4 SD 4.3 vs -1.2 SD 3.9, p=0.002. Percent -27.9 vs -7.9. Table 6 adverse events 6 (20.00 percent) vs 5 (16.13 percent), all mild, no serious events. Limitations named: sample not very large, no psychological or systemic illness on the sheet, 60 days is not long-term. Source of Support: Nil. Conflict of Interest: None. Extract supplied by Ixoreal Biomed. doi.org/10.4103/0253-7176.106022 · pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23439798 · ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3573577
Cohen S., Kamarck T., Mermelstein R. "A global measure of perceived stress." Journal of Health and Social Behavior 1983, 24, 386 to 396. The 10-item PSS the 2012 room used. doi.org/10.2307/2136404
Bech P. "Measuring the dimensions of psychological General Well-being by the WHO-5." QoL Newsletter 2004, 32, 15 to 16. The well-being index the 2012 screen used. Lower scores mark more stress.