Native Healers. Anita Ralph
•Immunomodulatory, cytotoxic, anti-tumour and anti-mutagenic.
•Anti-inflammatory, anti-allergic, antiviral and antifungal.
•Anti-hepatotoxic and improves nutrient absorption.
•Anti-stress effects, expectorant and adaptogenic effects.
Steroidal saponins
Steroidal saponins are less common in the plant world than other types of saponin, but they are of great pharmacological importance. This is because of their relationship to important compounds in human physiology such as sex hormones, cortisone, diuretic steroids, vitamin D and cardiac glycosides.
Scientific understanding of plant steroidal saponins led to the development and manufacture of drugs such as the contraceptive pill, and a plant that played a crucial role in this development was the edible yam, Dioscorea villosa L., although the plant itself does not contain hormones comparable to the contraceptive pill. Interestingly, wild yam has a long traditional use in the relief of problems associated with sex hormone imbalance.
Plant steroidal saponins have the capacity to block or stimulate receptor sites in our body cells, producing an amphoteric effect.
Definition—Amphoteric: Like a terracotta pot with two handles, it has a capacity to balance in either direction.
Another well-known plant containing steroidal saponins is fenugreek, Trigonella foenum-graecum L. which has a long history of use helping balance blood sugar levels.14 In modern times, it has been shown to have an effect in reducing cholesterol levels and having a positive effect on hormones called androgens.15
Soya beans and ginsengs are other examples of plants containing steroidal saponins.
Triterpenoid (pentacyclic) saponins
This group of saponin compounds can be found in a wide range of dicotyledonous plants including liquorice, Glycyrrhiza glabra L., primrose, Primula veris L., marigold, Calendula officinalis L. and horse chestnut, Aesculus hippocastanum L. The saponins found in these plants have an array of therapeutic benefits, including anti-inflammatory and expectorant effects.
Definition—Expectorant: An expectorant is a compound that makes coughing more effective by promoting the expulsion of mucous/phlegm. Mucous is produced by the body as a natural response to inflammation, in an effort to reduce that inflammation. A build-up of mucous can become a problem in its own right however, especially in the lungs.
Essential oils
Some of the most fascinating and complex of herbal constituents, essential oils (also referred to as volatile oils) are made up of several constituents.
The word volatile comes from the Latin Volare, meaning ‘to fly’, and refers to the fact that the fragrant oil is easily vaporised into the atmo-sphere where we can detect it with our olfactory cells, the smell receptors of our nose.
Poor quality, badly stored, badly prepared or old herbs can lose their essential oils, and thus lose a key component of their potential medicinal effect.
Curiously, essential oils are barely recognised as therapeutic agents by conventional medicine, excepting perhaps peppermint oil.
Mint family
The mint family contains a number of species that contain relatively large amounts of essential oil.
Fresh peppermint, Mentha x piperita L. contains 1% essential oil, and when you make an infusion of healthy peppermint leaves, the array of beneficial compounds in the tea includes essential oil of peppermint.
Note: Colpermin—a medical drug made of peppermint essential (volatile) oil in a capsule—is prescribed for the relief of IBS symptoms.
Using a distillation method, it is possible to isolate an essential oil and extract it from the other compounds found in the leaf. Peppermint pure essential oil is a highly aromatic volatile oil made up of a number of compounds including menthol. Isolated menthol is a highly irritant substance capable of burning the skin.
Definition—Menthol: An organic compound made synthetically or obtained from corn mint, peppermint or other mint oils. It is a waxy, crystalline substance, clear or white in colour, which is solid at room temperature.
The focus by the pharmaceutical industry on individual compounds within plants and their extraction leads to the isolation of substances that are markedly different from, and have different applications to, the original whole plant. They may not even be extracted from a plant at all. Drinking peppermint tea is a different experience from the use of peppermint essential oil in, say, a peppermint sweet, which is different again from using menthol, or mentholated products, which have been manufactured and need to be used with much more care.
Compounds within essential oils
Naturally occurring essential oils are, chemically speaking, mixtures of hydrocarbons and oxygenated compounds including terpenes, monoterpenes and sesquiterpenes. Menthol is an example of a monoterpene, as is camphor. You may recognise these two monoterpenes from common decongestant lozenges and inhalants for blocked nasal passages.
Monoterpenes have antiseptic properties, increase blood flow and act on the nervous system to relax muscles via nerve reflexes. They can therefore help relax painful digestive spasm. They have also been shown to reduce nervous excitability, and there is current research investigating potential beneficial effects of monoterpenes on period pain and childbirth, echoing traditional use of these aromatic compounds in some cultures.16,17
Sensorial tasting of medicinal plants
Our knowledge about plant compounds is nowadays confirmed by technologies not available to our forebears. For ancient peoples it was the sensory clues that gave rise to understanding the usefulness of plants. We still have these highly accurate senses: sight, smell, taste, touch, sound, which can be utilised to help us recognise some of the key qualities that a plant may have.
It is popularly thought that knowledge about the medicinal usefulness of certain plants was gained by trial and error. Whilst to some extent and in certain circumstances this may be true, a number of alternative theories also have credibility.
When asked about how people learned about the medicinal or toxic qualities of the native botanicals, botanist, zoologist and author of the bestselling book Supernature Lyall Watson tells us he was told that they asked the plant, and the plant spoke to them. When pushed for exact details of this, he was told that a leaf or part of the plant was placed on the tongue and information was transmitted.
Although this may sound a rather esoteric explanation of learning, it is an explanation repeated in other traditional cultures around the world. It is a record of some form of communication between human and plant and vice versa.
A young German poet and 17th-century scientist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe explored and systematised a method of plant exploration and ‘communication’ and this method was taken up and recorded by Rudolf Steiner in the early 20th century. He was keen to sensorially experience the phenomenon (in our case a plant), as a whole, not as dissected parts. Their work offers a more qualitative approach to plant study but both authors were keen to emphasise rigour in the application of the process.
For Goethe, it was the use of our senses without the confounding factor of our intellect that would give us an insight into the signature or essence of a living plant being. It allows the phenomenon to be felt by the researcher, perhaps in the same way as an artist captures the essence of a thing, so that we can recognise an oak tree in a painting made of only a few brush strokes.
The contemplation and use of our own ‘scientific instruments’—our senses, can allow profound recognition of inner laws, patterns and relationships that then facilitate the experience of