A single-blind parallel arm randomized placebo-controlled trial on the effect of Withania somnifera 6C in improving cardiorespiratory endurance in children undergoing athletic training

Professional athletes face challenges like exhausting training or intensive competition to push their bodies beyond our imagination. To prevent and recover from mental and physical health problems regular exercise, especially moderate or vigorous-intensity aerobic activity is important but at some instance this intense exercise can actually compromise health. Ashwagandha, otherwise known as Indian ginseng or poison gooseberry, belongs to the Solanaceae family. In addition to its adaptogenic properties, there are multiple medicinal benefits including antitumor, anti-inflammatory, hypoglycemic and antioxidant effects has been studied. The wide structural variety of withanolides might be related to the multiple biological functions that have been described for Ashwagandha: antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, immunomodulatory, neuroprotective, cytotoxic, and antioxidant, etc. Homoeopathy has shown its effectiveness in many fields but there aren’t much studies in the field of sports. For an athlete the most important part is improving their performance in the competition. But it is not an overnight process behind winning. They take a lot of effort and the main part is improving their stamina. It includes both mental and physical ability to sustain the activity for a long time. Homoeopathy can improve the general health and can also improve the performance of athletes performance.Study will be on subjects of 18 years and below. The sample will be selected through school health programmes and other volunteers from SKHMC. The total samples will be 30. Samples will be stratified based on age and sex. They will be divided into placebo group and medicinal group. Assessments like Height, Weight, exhaustion time, fitness index and VO2 max will be done before starting the study. These parameters will be obtained through Harvard step test and their CBC will also be assessed.  At the initial month they will be given regular exercise on a daily basis. Then for the next 3 months the samples will be divided into 2 groups, one group will be given placebo and the other group will be given Withania somnifera 6C on a random basis. Every subject will be adviced to take a proper diet. At the beginning of the 4th month again the fitness index will be calculated along with VO2max and exhaustion time along with CBC. The result will be obtained using paired t test, Chi-square test and correlation analysis.