Welcome to the Core Botanicals® blog.
Here we will explore a range of topics that we hope our community will enjoy for information, entertainment and to assist you on your health journey.
In our very first post, we’d love to tell you more about our brand and our founder, Paul Keogh.
Paul’s experience in herbal medicine spans over 35 years as a founder of brands including Core Botanicals®, Fusion Health® and Oriental Botanicals® and as a qualified naturopath and medical herbalist with extensive clinical experience.
In Byron Bay in 1999, Paul cofounded Fusion Health® and Oriental Botanicals®. After selling these brands in 2016, Paul’s passion for developing incredible Herbal Medicines only continued to grow.
This dedication to excellence and innovation has culminated in the launch of Core Botanicals®, whose goal is to provide you with the very best products to assist with your whole-health. We know this is a unique journey for each individual and we hope that we can help you with yours.
The Core Botanicals® range is a showcase of Paul’s knowledge, experience and love for his craft.
As well as having an impressive resume and track record of developing incredible Herbal Medicine, Paul is a loving husband to Amrita, father of five beautiful kids, Yoga enthusiast and keen traveler.
Paul, can you please tell us a bit about your why? Why this industry, why this brand and why now?
The “why” of my story goes back to my early experiences as a practicing naturopath in Alstonville, (Northern Rivers of NSW). Having sincerely and deeply studied natural medicine for 6 years - before qualifying as a medical herbalist and naturopath in 1986 - I felt strongly motivated to apply what I’d learnt, to share nature’s healing potential with others. I especially sought confirmation that herbal medicine was still relevant to our modern age and not merely an historical curiosity.
As I’m sure is common knowledge, when you feel a strong aspiration or motivation, reality quickly lets you know if you’re fooling yourself. And to my great surprise, not only did my immediate family and friends benefit from my practice of holistic medicine, but the community - which wasn’t ‘alternative’ per se - embraced it. Not only did my clinic get progressively busier but I started writing a weekly health column for the local newspaper and presenting a weekly live, radio talkback fielding questions from a broad cross section of listeners.
My experience over many years has reinforced that a successful practice pivots on identifying genuine needs and providing effective solutions. For me, the former skill is honed by maintaining an open mind and attention towards others - my patients and people taking my medicines - while the latter is largely dependent on access to high quality and potent herbal extracts and nutritional supplements. So, I started laboratory testing the quality parameters of my ingredients including potency, and manufacturing my own botanical extracts.
Little-by-little, I confirmed that herbal medicines could have profound clinical effects but only by optimising the combination (formulation/prescription) and assuring the purity and potency of all ingredients. Eventually, the popularity of my most successful botanical formulas led me to list them with the Australian Therapeutics Good Administration (TGA) and commercialise them through the health food and pharmacy sectors.
After dedicating 12 years to clinical practice, then another 16 years sharing my medicines with tens of thousands more people - supported by qualified practitioners working in retail healthcare (health food stores and pharmacies) - I’ve recently been inspired to further research and develop my medicines.
The ‘why’ of this effort was to see whether I could create integrated Chinese and western herbal medicines that meet modern standards of evidence, requiring the full traditional dosage for each ingredient. This wasn’t an easy task even with 35 years of industry experience. Ultimately, I needed to develop a special extraction process that concentrates the active botanical compounds to a strength (1500mg/mL) three times greater than the usual strength (500mg/mL) of liquid medicines available in Australia, and overseas.
Having successfully developed the manufacturing process, it’s wonderful and super exciting to see my vision come to life in Core Botanicals new, high-strength, high-quality herbal medicines.
It’s a family business and I’m thrilled to see Core Botanicals come to fruition.
I’ve put a lot of passion and meticulous care into the formulation of these products. My hope is that consumers can enjoy the benefits of these new formulas for years to come.
Where do the ideas for your formulations come from?
The inspiration for most of my formulas came out of paying careful attention to my patients’ needs, disclosed to me during my years in clinical practice, between 1987 and 1999.
In 1998, I dedicated myself full-time for one year to research and develop my ideas and clinical formulas. During this time, I listed the most widely applicable and effective medicines for common health problems on the Australian Registry of Therapeutic Goods (ARTG), which is administered by the Therapeutic Good Administration (TGA).
In the early 2000s, these medicines were made available to consumers under two brands, Fusion Health® and Oriental Botanicals®. Over the following 16 years, with the help of dedicated naturopathic staff and retail health professionals across Australia, my range of formulas expanded to more than 55 products, and grew in popularity to be amongst the most respected herbal medicines and nutritional supplements in retail healthcare, especially health food stores but also pharmacies.
Without the initial creative inspiration from my patients and the subsequent support from retail health professionals, my formulations would never have evolved into what they are today. In fact, the new Core Botanicals® range of concentrated, herbal extracts represents the pinnacle of my 35-year career in formulating and producing quality herbal medicines that deliver the benefits of traditional multi-herb formulations, in a convenient “all-in-one” liquid extract form.
What should customers expect from Core Botanicals®?
My continuing motivation is a striving for excellence in the production of herbal medicines with real therapeutic potential. To achieve this, I’ve integrated the ancient wisdom of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) with the modern approaches and manufacturing practices of Western herbal medicine.
When taken as directed, people should expect results in line with the indications on the label of each and every Core Botanicals® medicine.
Of the first four products in the Core Botanicals® range, which one is your favourite and why?
Although every formula in the Core Botanicals® range has unique properties, I’ve always had a soft spot for the ASTRADEFEN® formula. This is because it was my very first clinical experience of the potency of traditional Chinese medicine, for which there was no equivalent in Western herbal medicine.
Back in 1992, my teacher and mentor Associate Professor Denis Stewart, introduced me to the original version of this profound immune tonic. Called Astragalus 8 back then, hundreds of my patients subsequently benefited from taking this traditionally-evidenced combination of eight Chinese herbs including Astragalus to promote immune defence, improve immunity and help reduce the occurrence of common colds, and Ginseng to assist with recovery from illness.
The results blew my mind and motivated me to seriously and deeply explore the power and potential of traditional Chinese medicine for my patients. The rest, as they say, is history because I went on to develop many more integrated Chinese and Western herbal formulas, including those now available in the Core Botanicals® range.
Why did you choose for these products to be Made in Australia?
In a nutshell, Australian herbal medicine standards are world-leading with internationally respected, rigorous regulatory controls and manufacturing systems.
In addition, the use of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) goes back to the early settlement of Australia by Europeans and especially from when Chinese miners arrived on the Australian gold fields around 1854. By 1911, Chinese herbal medicines were sold in Australia with English labels and directions.
When around 1989-1990 the Australian Therapeutics Goods Administration (TGA) established a registry of permissible herbal ingredients, hundreds of Chinese herbs were added. Finally, since my 35 years of industry expertise was gained in the Australian context, I’m confident that Australia has the necessary systems and controls to support the continuing development of my vision to provide herbal medicines of the highest quality, safety and efficacy.
