PHYTOMANIA : MEDICINAL HERBS

PANAS GINSENG
(and other Panax species)
ELEUTHEROCOCUS SENTICOSUS
plants and medicine : ginseng
Family: Araliacea
Common name: ginseng, panax, siberian ginseng

Description: perennial shrubs from China, Korea, Siberia and north America, mostly endangered, and now cultivated (mainly in USA and Canada). Traditionally used in China since a very long time

Parts used: root and rootlets

Constituents: ginsenosides, phenolic ethers

Actions: "adaptogenic", antioxydant (antiradicalar), tonic, antiasthenic

Main indications: fatigue, stress, asthenia, moderate diabetes type 2, to enhance mental and athletic performances, atherosclerosis, sequel of radiotherapy, aging, low immunity following viral infection

Contra indications: avoid in patient with hormone sensitive conditions (genital cancers) and high blood pressure. Treatment duration limited to 3 months

Drug: tablet(standardized to ginsenosides), tincture, fluid extracts


 


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PERSEA AMERICANA
health and alternative medicine : avocado
Family: Lauraceae
Common name: avocado

Description: perennial tree up to 20 meter high, indigenous to tropical America (Mexico, Guatemala) but now cultivated in many tropical and subtropical regions. many varieties have been isolated, most of them need crosspollination because male and female organs are not mature at the same time making autofecondation impossible.
Fruit is a drupe, pearshaped or nearly round, skin from yellow to purple to almost black; flesh pale to yellow-green, buttery and and nutlike in flavour. one big seed.

Parts used: fruit

Constituents: fruit's pulp : 65-80% water, 2-10% sugars, 1-4% protein, 3-30% lipid (oil), vitamin A, E B and small amount of C; oil is thick,greenish and nutty, it does not get rancid easily ; mean composition (oleic acid 42-63%, palmitic acid 17-29%, linoleic acid 9-16%, linolenic acid less than 1%, unsaponifiable 1 to 2 %). Seed (12% tanin, 13% starch)

Actions: dietetic, cosmetic, anti-inflammatory, astringent

Main indications: food (2000 to 3000 Kcal / Kg), cosmetic use (skin care, hair care, lotion, soap), unsaponifiable (conjonctive tissue inflammation like parondopathies, sclerodermia, arthrosis; traditional use of the seed as an astringent (diarrhea, mouth ulcers)

Contra indications: unripe avocado said to be toxic(specially the skin), leaves cause mastitis to cattle, horses, rabbits and goats

Drug: fresh fruit, fruit's oil, unsaponifiable,

 

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PSIDIUM GUAJAVA
Family: Myrtaceae
Common name: guava

Description: small hardwood tree from 3 to 10 meter high, perennial from Tropical America (Peru and the Amazonian rain forest) now disseminated in all the tropical regions and considered as invasive in several Pacific Islands. Fruit, roundish, 5 to 10 cm diameter, yellow when ripe, with a pink endocarp(pulp) that contains many small seeds, hard, yellow or brown, kydneyshaped

Parts used: fruit, leaves

Constituents: fruit : 10 to 15% sugars, pectin, vitamin C (25 to 500 mg much higher than Citrus species), vitamin A, iron, calcium; fruit's epicarp (tanins).
Leaves (essential oil, tanins, flavonoids)

Actions: dietetic, antiseptic astringent, antioxydant, antidiabetic

Main indications: good source of vitamin C (viral infections, asthenia), diarrhea (dysentery), gastroenteritis(especially rotaviral infections), wounds, dermatosis, moderate diabetes type 2, vaginal discharge(leucorrhea), mouth ulcers

Contra indications: none for the fruit pulp. Leaves : hypoglycaemia

Drug: fresh fruit's pulp (juice, jelly), deshydrated fruit's pulp, leaves infusion and decoction

 


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Copyright 2005 Jean-Michel Hurtel
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Toute reproduction interdite. All rights reserved
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