Down to Earth
(Page 2 of 2)
April/May 2007
By Jim Long
To treat bronchitis, colds, diarrhea, fevers and headaches, 19th-century practitioners on and off the battlefield often used catnip.
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If you had a stomachache, odds are you would have been treated with either peppermint or bee balm. Bee balm, widely grown as a garden plant today, also was valued for treating headaches and inducing sweating.
For a sore throat, gargling with alum root (Heuchera americana) might have been prescribed. Marshmallow (Althaea officinalis) was used to treat inflammations of the throat, mouth and digestive tract.
War-time use of these and other plants helped determine which plants were effective and which were not. The plants found to be both useful and safe still are valued and used, although often in other forms. Those that were ineffective were set aside. Now they are merely interesting remnants of a bygone era.
Reading old books on plant medicines can be fun and enlightening. But never assume that the traditional use of an herb is necessarily safe or effective. If you are considering using a plant medicinally, be sure to check modern references. Even plants that have proven to be useful can vary greatly in strength. And some can interfere with pharmaceutical medications you might be taking.
By looking back at the way medicine was practiced in our not-so-distant past, we can see that health care really has come a long way. I am confident that our national debate about health care will bring about important and innovative changes in the years ahead. And, who knows … maybe some of our future treatments will derive from those used in the past.
— Contributing Editor Jim Long writes and gardens at his farm, Long Creek Herbs, located in the Ozarks Mountains. He welcomes questions and comments. To contact him, visit www.HerbCompanion.com/Contributors.
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