When you’re perusing the aisles of your local drugstore for topical creams that contain aloe, you’re most likely doing it because of a skin problem, hoping this unique herb will unleash its miracle healing powers. But if you think that aloe’s healing powers are only skin deep, you are truly underestimating one of Africa’s most extraordinary native plants.

In the first season of the blockbuster television series Lost—the show where survivors of a plane crash observe odd occurrences while stranded on a far away island—viewers discover that one of the cast members, Shannon, suffers from asthma. While asthma medication was one of the things culled from the plane wreckage, the heel of the group, Sawyer, who happened to find the medication, refuses to give it to her for reasons only he knows. But thanks to the quick thinking and natural health knowledge of the Korean woman, Sun, she finds aloe leaves in the woods to relieve Shannon’s distress. In minutes, after rubbing the aloe leaves on Shannon’s upper chest, she is able to breathe again, thanks to the soothing aroma the juices of aloe exude.

Serving as an alternative to asthma medication and as a balm to skin lesions are two very good reasons why aloe is known as the miracle herb. But aloe is positively reverential when you consider the number of studies that have been done to show its healing effects in boosting immune function, eliminating malignant tumors, easing joint inflammation, and in stabilizing blood sugar levels just to name a few.

According to a 2000 study published in the American Association of Cancer Research, the researchers indicated that aloe “might represent a conceptually new lead anti-tumor drug” due to a compound found in aloe leaves, called hydroxyanthraquinone, which was found to inhibit the growth of human neuroectodermal tumors.

In another study, this one done in 1994 and published in the Journal of the American Podiatric Medical Association, doctors from the Pennsylvania College of Podiatric Medicine discovered that the growth components found in aloe actually blocked the chemical compounds that inhibit wounds from healing, and also reduced joint inflammation by 36 percent when aloe was taken for four days at doses of 100 to 300 mg per day. For those who’d prefer to use aloe topically, that’s been shown to work as well, as a 1989 study published in the same journal indicates (a 47 percent blockage of inflammation).

Finally, for the approximately 21 million Americans with diabetes—seven percent of the population, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention—aloe has been shown to work wonders on stabilizing blood sugar levels. In a 2001 study done by doctors from the University of Istanbul and published in the journal Phytotherapy Research, doctors set out to settle once and for all the years of speculation of aloe’s hypoglycemic properties. To determine the veracity of aloe’s effects, the doctors performed three experiments on three separate groups of mice. One group was non-diabetic, another had type I diabetes, and the third group had type II. On each group, they used aloe vera leaf pulp gel to determine if it could lower the blood sugar levels of their blood. Their results: no difference in blood sugar levels of the mouse that was not diabetic, but there were hypoglycemic effects in the mice with type I and type II diabetes.

What explains these amazing findings? No one knows for sure. What we do know is that aloe is a truly amazing herb that contains the same muscle building amino acids, enzymes, vitamins and minerals that health experts have long promoted in order to achieve optimal health. It’s yet another example of the natural, health-promoting properties nature has to offer.

* Important notes: It is recommended that you seek the advice of a qualified healthcare practitioner prior to using aloe vera or any alternative therapies. Any recommended doses are for those over age 18. Always check herb and vitamin use with your child’s health care practitioner prior to administering them.