Read The Everything Guide to Herbal Remedies Online
Authors: Martha Schindler Connors
The Everything Guide to Herbal Remedies (3 page)
As early civilizations developed, they slowly left behind the hunting-and-gathering routine in favor of cultivation, building settlements, and developing a more cohesive social structure. In virtually every part of the world, herbs were part of the arsenal of healers, who combined spiritual and religious elements in their medicine.
Before test tubes and research labs, herbalists around the world used a decidedly nonscientific method called “the doctrine of signatures,” which held that plants (or plant parts) that looked like a human body part would benefit that part. Thus, medieval healers recommended the phallus-shaped mandrake
(Mandragora officinarum)
root for impotence and the brainy-looking walnut
(Juglans regia)
for mental disorders.
As people began to grow and gather herbs, they learned, through experience, trial-and-error, and plain old luck, which plants could be useful and which ought to be avoided.
To help them understand the complexities of their world, primitive people came up with a pantheon of gods, spirits, and supernatural forces, many of which were directly tied to the natural world. In time, people around the world began to realize that sickness and disease (or health and vitality, for that matter) were created by natural and not supernatural processes. At that point, the healing profession split into separate factions, with the physician on one side and the priest on the other.
In the early nineteenth century, scientists began extracting and modifying the active ingredients from plants and transforming those ingredients into synthetic drugs. Gradually, medicine—and popular tastes—shifted from herbals to pharmaceuticals.
In 1820, the U.S. Pharmacopeia (USP) published its first standards compendium, then consisting of only natural medicines. But things were changing, and in the United States and many other Western countries, herbal medicine was quickly moving from its place as the primary health care system to a type of supplemental care.
Many countries, including India and Germany, now consider many herbs to be medicines (and therefore regulate them as drugs). According to the latest report from the World Health Organization (WHO), ninety-two countries have an official registration system for herbal medicines, and seventeen of them have more than 1,000 herbal medicines registered.
In the United States, herbs have been regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and its predecessor agencies for the past 100 years. In 1994, the government passed the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA), which classified nearly all herbal products as dietary supplements—to be handled like foods, not medicines.
Until recently, herbal medicine was practiced outside of conventional medicine, the system of pharmaceuticals and surgery that most Americans think of when they think of health care. But these days, herbalism is going mainstream, as more and more people catch on to its benefits—and more and more studies show the power of plants in treating and preventing disease. The various schools of complementary and alternative treatments (including herbal medicine) are known collectively as CAM. Combining CAM with conventional medicine is known as integrative medicine.
Although you should always consult a medical professional in the case of a serious injury or chronic disease, you can use herbs to treat many minor health problems and to maintain your overall health. And with your doctor’s approval, you also can add herbs to many conventional medical treatments. In many cases, you don’t need the firepower that pharmaceutical drugs provide; the gentler properties of herbs will serve you much better.
Indeed, one of the biggest selling points for many MDs is the disease-preventing power that many herbs have. Research continues to show that various preventive measures—getting enough exercise, eating healthy foods, etc.—can stave off many diseases, and herbs with nutritional value fit the bill nicely. Consider the case of antioxidants, a class of plant chemicals that prevent cell damage caused by reactive molecules known as free radicals. Research shows certain micronutrients—most notably vitamins C and E and the mineral selenium—have high antioxidant levels. But many medicinal and culinary herbs are also antioxidant powerhouses. Some of the biggest include tea
(Camellia sinensis),
elderberry
(Sambucus nigra),
rosemary
(Rosmarinus officinalis),
and turmeric
(Curcuma longa).
Herbs also can work as complementary or adjunct therapies, enhancing the effects of conventional drugs and/or treatments and offsetting any side effects they might produce.
For example, ginger
(Zingiber officinale)
can relieve post-operative and chemotherapy-induced nausea.
Tea
(Camellia sinensis)
is the world’s second most popular beverage (behind water). It comes in three varieties: green, which is unfermented, oolong, which is partially fermented, and black, which is completely fermented. All are good for you, but green tea seems to have the highest levels of polyphenols, the phytochemicals credited with many of tea’s benefits.
In other cases, herbs can accentuate the benefits of conventional treatments. For example, cancer patients who take cordyceps mushrooms
(Cordyceps sinensis)
after chemotherapy treatments seem to get a boost in cellular immunity. And a new study shows that combining chemotherapy with the Chinese herb astragalus
(Astragalus membranaceus)
works better than chemotherapy alone at stimulating the patient’s immune system. Other studies have shown that the turkey tail, or coriolus, mushroom
(Trametes versicolor,
Coriolus versicolor)
can significantly prolong cancer survival when taken in conjunction with chemotherapy or radiation treatment.
Many health care professionals, including naturopathic physicians, chiropractors, and practitioners of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Ayurveda (the ancient system of health care of India), use herbs and herbal formulations. Herbs also play a part in other types of natural health care, including aromatherapy and homeopathy.
Aromatherapy is the practice of using aromatic plants to treat various conditions and maintain overall health. It dates back to the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, who used fragrant plant oils in healing baths and therapeutic massage.
Legend has it that modern “aromatherapy” was born in the 1920s, when a French chemist inadvertently discovered the power of plant oils when he burned his hand and plunged it into the nearest cool liquid he could find: a vat of lavender oil. The pain was relieved and the burn healed remarkably well, with no inflammation, blistering, or scarring.
Modern aromatherapy uses
essential oils,
which are volatile liquids distilled in a way that selects miniscule molecules and leaves behind heavier plant waxes, oils, and other materials. Thus, essential oils are incredibly potent and deliver what the experts consider to be the “essential” parts of the plant: its phytochemicals and its scent.
Today, aromatherapy is practiced by aerial diffusion, direct inhalation, and topical application (via massage). Experts theorize that it works in two ways. The first is through aroma, which moves through the olfactory system to stimulate limbic (emotional) centers of the brain. The other is through a direct pharmacological effect: The oils’ beneficial compounds are delivered via the skin or mucous membranes.
Homeopathy is a school of natural medicine developed in eighteenth-century Germany and based on a simple theory, called “the law of similars,” which holds that a substance that produces symptoms in a healthy person will cure a sick person showing the same symptoms (the word
homeopathy
comes from two Greek words:
homoios,
meaning “similar,” and
pathos,
meaning “sickness”). In shorthand: “Like cures like."
The “like cures like” theory of homeopathy is not as far-out as it might seem. It’s actually rooted in ancient Greek tradition, where it was called
similia similibus curentur,
or the “similia principle.” Centuries before homeopathy was developed, Hippocrates had found that he could treat recurrent vomiting with an emetic herb (one that would ordinarily be used to induce vomiting).
The other basic tenet of homeopathy is the law of potentization, which holds that the lower the dose of a medicine, the greater its potency—and effect. Homeopathic remedies are sold according to their potency: The ingredients are diluted, then shaken over and over again (in a process called
succussion)
until there are only miniscule amounts of the original compound (or none at all) remaining.
Many homeopathic remedies are derived from plants, and others use minerals and animal parts.
Flower essences, also known as flower remedies, were developed in the early twentieth century by British physician and homeopath Edward Bach (pronounced “Batch”), who felt that many, if not all, of the physical problems people face are tied to our emotional state. According to Bach, you could be healthy only after you cast out the negative emotions—fear, worry, animosity, and indecision—that destroy your body’s equilibrium.