Do you have Echinacea? This flower can not only decorate the garden, but also come in handy to strengthen our immunity. Let's take a closer look at what makes Echinacea remarkable. The healing properties and contraindications to help, and not harm our health, you just need to know. This useful perennial is endowed with bright beauty and the same unique beneficial properties.
Echinacea flower photo:
Echinacea: flower in the garden
In its form, the Echinacea flower resembles a chamomile, however its petals can be painted in a deep pink, orange, purple or lilac shade. This plant loves the sun and fertile, preferably drained soil. In nature, there are other types of echinacea, but the most popular is Echinacea purpurea. It can often be found in gardens and summer cottages. In addition to external attractiveness, it is valuable for its immunomodulating, antiviral properties. The advantages of Echinacea purpurea are recognized not only by folk, but also by official medicine.
This is a fairly tall plant (100-120 cm) with large flowers and branched roots with many thin processes.
What is Echinacea useful for?
People often ask this question, even if Echinacea is already growing on their site. What to collect, leaves or flowers? The answer is this: all parts of this perennial are equally useful. The roots of the plant contain essential oils and resins, phenol carboxylic acids, betaine, calcium, iron, zinc, aluminum, potassium, manganese, magnesium, selenium, molybdenum and other mineral compounds.
When to pick Echinacea flowers? Ideally, at the very beginning of its flowering, when the content of active substances in all parts of the flower reaches its peak.
It is also advisable to stock up medicinal raw materials in the very middle of summer, in July, when the plant is in the phase of mass flowering. Typically, the cut part of the stem is 20-30 cm, the buds and foliage are crushed and dried thoroughly. A method of drying in bunches is also common: the stems are tied and suspended down by inflorescences.
When the echinacea purpurea fades (in autumn), you can begin to harvest the root. The root extracted from the ground is cleaned of the ground, washed well and cut into pieces, then rinsed again with water and dried in the oven (with a slightly open door - for ventilation).
The roots of Echinacea, photo:
Also for these purposes, you can use an electric dryer for vegetables.
There is an important point: drying of the rhizome of Echinacea purpurea should be done only at high temperature!
You can’t just wash, cut the roots and spread them on clean paper, because at the drying temperature below + 60 ° C they will rot. Next, the medicinal raw materials are transferred to airtight containers for storage. You can also grind all plant fragments in a coffee grinder and pour such healing “tea” into glass jars with tight lids.
Echinacea: benefits and harms
One of the most remarkable qualities of a plant is its positive effect on human immunity. Biologically active components and minerals, present in large quantities in the composition of echinacea, significantly enhance the vitality of the body and create a kind of shield against diseases. It can be said without exaggeration that echinacea for raising immunity is the best natural medicine that can be given even to children.
Preparations and infusions (teas, decoctions) based on this flower are used internally and applied externally. Compresses and lotions are successfully used for burns, abscesses, wounds, manifestations of eczema or urticaria, streptococcal skin lesions, bedsores.
Intake is recommended for all kinds of infections, internal inflammatory processes, after chemotherapy, for diabetes, for colds, after taking antibiotics, for liver, kidney, stomach and intestinal diseases.
Properties of Echinacea
The list of properties of Echinacea purpurea is quite wide:
- antiviral;
- immunomodulatory;
- detoxification;
- antifungal;
- antiviral;
- sugar excreting;
- anti-inflammatory;
- antiallergic;
- antirheumatic;
- decongestants.
In addition, drugs that contain echinacea suppress the growth and development of staphylococcus, E. coli, streptococcus, herpes, and also regulates lipid metabolism.
The beneficial properties of echinacea also extend to improving the condition of the skeletal system. Pharmaceutical preparations and folk medicines have long been successfully used to treat and strengthen joints.
Echinacea, as an immunomodulator, acts on the human immune system, models it depending on what its initial state was.
Focusing on the immunomodulating qualities of the plant, I want to clarify that echinacea is precisely an immunomodulator, and not an immunostimulant. The latter includes aloe, ginseng, eleutherococcus, lemongrass - they are recommended to be used inside for a certain period. Immunostimulants support the body's strength and tone it.
Dried flowers and leaves of Echinacea, photo:
Immunomodulators, and in our case, echinacea for immunity (a natural medicine), tune the body to self-healing, "launch" its internal resources. If you suddenly get a seasonal SARS or the flu, start taking Echinacea decoction. You will definitely see a change in your condition for the better, and the disease itself will go much faster and easier. Below I will give some simple folk recipes that you can cook yourself. By the way, Echinacea tincture is sold in almost every pharmacy and is relatively inexpensive. If you have not had time to stock up on medicinal raw materials, then this alcohol tincture will definitely come in handy in your home medicine cabinet.
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Echinacea: contraindications and side effects
Like any medicinal plant, it has contraindications for use.
Individual intolerance to the components of echinacea should not be ruled out. Remember that the course of treatment with drugs or tinctures should not exceed 10 days (sometimes two weeks). If you overdo it with treatment, you can earn insomnia or nervous irritability. You should start taking it with small doses so that the body gets used to the new medicine.
Contraindications: Echinacea purpurea is prohibited for use:
- In case of threatened miscarriage during pregnancy.
- With multiple sclerosis.
- With leukemia.
- For any autoimmune disease.
- During lactation.
- With hypertension.
- With progressive cancer.
- With tuberculosis.
- With lupus erythematosus.
- With AIDS and HIV Carriage.
- With acute manifestations of angina.
- With bronchospasm.
If you experience nausea, numbness in your tongue or palate, an upset stomach, or a headache when taking Echinacea, stop taking it and notify your doctor about these symptoms. The same applies to external use - ointments and creams with echinacea can provoke a rash and / or itching. If you have previously had an allergy to ragweed or other floral representatives, keep in mind that you are at risk, an allergy to echinacea can also be.
Echinacea for pregnant women and children
In a separate paragraph I want to clarify the possibility of using decoctions and preparations based on echinacea by pregnant women and children. A lot of controversial opinions arise on this subject, but, again, we recall the well-known: “in a spoon - medicine, in a cup - poison”. In both cases, the dose should be carefully verified and agreed with the doctor.
Echinacea for children
Despite the fact that earlier in medical practice, children were forbidden to give echinacea, clinical studies have proved the opposite. A positive effect of the plant on the children's body was noted, today the preparation "Immunal" (the main substance of which is echinacea) is officially approved for use in children from 1 year of age. Frequent colds in babies are caused by immature immunity. That is why this natural immunomodulator increases the body's resistance to disease, thereby eliminating the "root of evil" - the very cause of the disease.
Studies have shown that at the very peak of the disease, echinacea for children should be taken in combination with other antiviral drugs and supporting vitamins. When the body is already at the stage of recovery, you can use echinacea as the main (and only) drug. It is not always convenient for children to swallow tablets, but candies and syrup based on this useful plant will only please them. By the way, doctors often recommend diluting baby syrups with water before use. If your child has a tendency to diathesis, it may be that the syrup is not suitable for him, since it contains sugar in its composition.
Echinacea purpurea, photo:
As for alcohol tinctures, they, of course, are prohibited for children of any age. To raise immunity for very young children (up to 1 year of age), the doctor can prescribe a decoction of echinacea. Children from 1 year to 6 years old are given a children's “Immunal” in the form of drops, usually the doctor recommends taking 4 to 8 drops 3 times a day. Herbal tablets of the same name should be crushed before use and diluted with clean water. From 6 to 12 years old, children can be given decoctions, extracts, syrups, teas with echinacea. And, of course, always consult a doctor beforehand, even if you intend to give your child a weakly brewed medicinal tea.
Echinacea during pregnancy
In all kinds of women's forums, one can often come across disputes about the use of echinacea during pregnancy. One half of the mothers claims that this plant is strictly contraindicated, while the other actively recommends it for use. Let's look at this issue in more detail. During the bearing of the child, immunity is significantly reduced - nature itself took care of this, because in the early stages too powerful immunity can determine the fetus as a foreign body. In such cases, the risk of miscarriage increases sharply, and so that this does not happen, the body itself “lowers” the immune system in a physiological way.
That is why in the first trimester of pregnancy, doctors do not recommend taking any medications, even natural ones. After all, as we know, at this time all vital organs are formed in the child. Another important reason for the prohibition of Echinacea is the factor in the failure of immunity in the fetus. This happens if the expectant mother listened to the recommendations of incompetent people and did not consult a doctor — she actively drank tea, took pills, or injected Echinacea Compositum S.
While the stimulation of maternal immunity occurs, children's immunity simply "gets used" to this state of affairs - his body does not feel the need to develop protection. When a child is born, he simply will not be protected against bacteria and viruses.
Echinacea during pregnancy can be used only under the watchful eye of a doctor! Doses of use should be strictly established with individual consideration of the characteristics of the body.
Applying echinacea externally is entirely acceptable if there is a need for it, but a decoction or tea - only after consulting your doctor.
Echinacea: the use of decoctions and tinctures
I want to describe several folk ways of making decoctions and tinctures from echinacea. Parts of the plant can be either fresh or dried. Broths are best prepared in a water bath, so the plant will retain more useful ingredients. You can separately brew foliage, roots and flowers, or you can mix all the parts together.
What is needed for this:
- Take 1 tbsp. l finely chopped medicinal raw materials, pour 0.5 liters of water and incubated in a water bath for 15-20 minutes. After cooling, filter and use a quarter cup twice a day, morning and evening, 10 minutes before eating.
- For 0.5 liters of water, take 2 tbsp. any parts of the plant, we stand half an hour in a water bath. After the broth cools down, filter it and take inside one or two tablespoons 3 times a day.
- To prepare the infusion, take 1 tbsp. chopped roots, leaves or flowers, pour 250 g of boiling water, cover with a dense object and stand for half an hour. After the specified time, the infusion should be filtered and taken orally one third of a glass, three times a day before meals.
- To make alcohol tincture, you need to take 0.5 l of quality vodka and 150 g of dried and crushed roots of Echinacea. If you want to add flowers or leaves, then 50 g of buds and / or leaves will be enough. We place the crushed raw materials in a jar, pour vodka, close the lid, put in a dark corner for two to three weeks. From time to time, the jar should be shaken. After the specified time, the contents of the can should be filtered and then take 10-20 drops (it is better to start with small doses) three times a day. You should not take tincture for more than 10 days, the doctor should allow you further treatment.
Echinacea, whose beneficial properties are still being studied by scientists, can enhance the actions of other drugs, or, conversely, reduce their effectiveness.
Any use and use of echinacea should be agreed with your doctor - do not ignore this rule. Even if you do not have contraindications for its use, incompatibility with another drug may occur that you may be taking at this time.
Echinacea, the medicinal properties and contraindications of which we examined in this article, with a competent approach to business, can become a real elixir of health and a source of vital energy.