The Earthwise Herbal Repertory

by Matthew Wood

  Note: These symptoms are usually associated with hepatitis or cirrhosis.

  Jaundice (Liver, Gall Bladder): • Agrimonia (tense, pinched, yellow-grey complexion) • Artemisia absinthium • Artemisia vulgaris • Berberis (with Agrimonia and Taraxacum) • Betonica (wan, leaden complexion with weakness of gall-bladder reflexes) • Bupleurum • Centaurium • Chelidonium (yellow complexion, gall-bladder congestion; pain under right shoulder blade) • Chelone (malarial) • Chionanthus (cramp on right side, stoppage of bile ducts, constipation) • Cichorium • Citrus limonum (acute jaundice, hepatic torpor, red tongue, alkaline urine) • Cnicus benedictus • Curcuma • Euonymus • Galium • Hydrastis (infection, weakness and congestion in the gall bladder) • Juglans nigra (leaf tea) • Veronicastrum (pale, dry skin, thick-coated tongue, moderate hepatic pain) • Linaria • Mahonia • Marrubium (yellowness of the eyes) • Monarda fistulosa (bloated and yellow complexion with gall-bladder congestion) • Myrica (infantile jaundice) • Nux vomica (homeopathic; infantile jaundice) • Podophyllum (catarrhal, bloated, sallow; clay-colored stool; very small dose) • Prunella • Taraxacum (long-term gall bladder congestion) • Veronica.

  Hepatitis: • Achillea (poultice over liver) • Agrimonia (acute viral) • Andrographis • Arctium • Artemisia absinthium (acute viral) • Asperula • BERBERIS • BUPLEURUM (yellowish, dark, reddish complexion) • Bryonia (pain on movement) • Calendula • Chelidonium • Chelone • Chionanthus (light, frothy stools, scanty urine, pain in right hypochondrium) • Cichorium • CNICUS (deep chills, terrible flu feeling, jaundice) • CURCUMA (combine with pepper) • Cynara • Dioscorea • Fouquieria (“chronic abdominal pain and hemorrhoidal aching after acute symptoms have disappeared”—M. Moore) • Galium • Ganoderma • Glycyrrhiza • Hyssopus (acute viral) • Iris (acute viral) • Isatis • LARREA (massive doses have caused hepatitis, appropriate small doses help) • Lentinula (chronic) • Leonurus • Linaria • Mahonia • Melissa (acute viral) • MENYANTHES (acute viral) • Prunella • Rehmannia (uncooked root) • Salvia miltorrhiza (scar tissue) • Schisandra • Silybum (acute, chronic) • Taraxacum • Veronicastrum.

  Note: Bacteria, viruses, or poisons can cause hepatitis (liver inflammation). The major diagnostic indication is elevated liver enzymes in the blood from hepatic-cell die-off. Today there are specific drugs that can completely eliminate hepatitis. There may be cases, however, where herbs are still needed to completely eliminate disease and the enzymes in the blood (from personal clinical experience).

  Cirrhosis: • Acorus • Agrimonia • Berberis • Chelone • Dioscorea • Euonymus • Fouquieria • Iris • Menyanthes • Silybum • Taraxacum.

  Ascites: • Apocynum cannabinum (“whenever the ascites is the principle trouble, if the symptoms indicate no other remedy”—Clarke; small doses) • Juglans nigra • Liatris.

  FORMULARY

  In the following formulas, dandelion root (Taraxacum) should be used.

  Beta—Silybum, Taraxacum, Lavandula, Petroselinum (tonic). Wood.

  Chionanthus—with Berberis, Peumus (liver and gall bladder). BHP 1983, 156.

  Mahonia—with Arctium, Salvia, Silybum (liver, dry skin, eczema). Wood.

  Taraxacum—with 10% Podophyllum (laxative, cholagogue). BHP 1983, 167.

  Taraxacum—with Berberis, Veronicastrum (hepatic, cathartic). BHP 1983, 229.

  Taraxacum—with Chelidonium, Berberis (gall-bladder disease). BHP 1983, 62.

  Taraxacum—with Petroselinum, Hydrastis, Berberis (hepatic disease). BHP 1983, 155.

  Taraxacum—with Silybum (liver) widespread formula.

  Gall Bladder

  When the liver has finished making the bile, it secretes it into the bile ducts. The bile leaves the liver in many little rivulets, which conjoin into a single channel that runs all the way down into the duodenum, where it is secreted to emulsify fats and oils. Bile is both hydrophilic and lipophilic, so it conjoins with water and oil, emulsifying the dietary lipids into a slurry that can be more easily digested.

  Stationed partway down this duct is the gall bladder, a sac in which the bile is collected between meals for use during digestion. When the pyloric valve of the stomach opens to send food into the duodenum, it sends a signal to the gall bladder and gall duct to open and dump bile. Just before the sphincter where it opens into the duodenum, the gall duct is joined by a channel from the pancreas, full of pancreatic enzymes ready to jump on the digestate and tear it down. So the bile and digestive enzymes are released together.

  The main function of the gall bladder is therefore a fairly simple one—to store and release bile. Problems with the gall bladder are likewise fairly simple. The gall ducts and bladder are innervated by the autonomic nervous system, which controls the digestive tract as a whole. Unconscious autonomic nervous tension causes spasms and mistimings of the release of bile—but these unpleasant symptoms can become very conscious.

  Gall bladder problems were once much more common than today. Due to the prevalence of malaria, many people suffered from chills running through the autonomic. This resulted in “biliousness”—nausea, diarrhea alternating with constipation, and a taste of bile in the throat—one of the most common ailments of our ancestors, mentioned here because it helps us understand the older literature. Biliousness may be equated with GERD—gastric esophageal reflex disease—except that we commonly get the symptoms from eating heavy, greasy food, not the malaria mosquito.

  Migraine headaches follow the “gall bladder meridian” of TCM from the gall bladder up over the scapula to the occiput, across the right (sometimes left) side of the head, to the eye, and sometimes down an inch below the eye. The suffering person sometimes notes indigestion or even pain in the gall bladder before the advent of the headache. This was called “bilious headache” by the old Western authors and “gall bladder headache” in Traditional Chinese Medicine. For remedies, see the “migraine” entry in the “Headache” sections (under “Brain and Head”).

  The other major gall bladder problem is stone formation caused by condensation of bile in the gall ducts and bladder. Mucus, calcification, heat, spasm, torpor, and inactivity can cause the bile to thicken and turn into “stones” (which may not be entirely stone-like or even made of bile). This leads to more inflammation, pain, spasm, and ultimately gall bladder removal. Many times, however, the pain continues even after the gall bladder is removed. This is because the conditions are not limited to the gall bladder itself but run back up into the gall ducts draining out of the liver, which is also under autonomic control and subject to the same pathological influences—mucus, heat, spasm, etc. Therefore, in order to cure the underlying problems of the gall bladder and related system, we need to correct the tissue imbalance by cooling or warming, toning or relaxing, drying or moistening.

  Biliousness: • Agrimonia (gall bladder unsynchronized with digestion; alternating diarrhea and constipation; chills; stress) • Artemisia absinthium • Berberis (acute and chronic conditions from food or drug excess) • Chelidonium (sallow complexion; pain in right side to scapula or occiput on either side; migraine—any or all of these) • CHIONANTHUS (bilious colic) • CINCHONA (exhaustion and biliousness after chills—Scudder) • Cornus florida • Cynara • DIOSCOREA (headache, nausea, vomiting, cramps; skin dry and husky) • Euonymus (bilious indigestion) • EUPATORIUM PERFOLIATUM • Gillenia trifoliata (intermittent; bilious fevers) • IRIS (bilious attack; headache, diarrhea, cramps) • Larrea (chronic, with symptoms of “toxic liver”) • Linaria • Liriodendron (tension and weakness) • Menyanthes • MAHONIA (acute and chronic, from food or drug excess) • Nux vomica (homeopathic) • PEUMUS (gall-bladder problems, where people have lost the “joy of life”—Welliver) • Podophyllum (full, puffy, sallow face, complexion, and liver area; very small dose) • Potentilla (analogue to Agrimonia) • Tilia • Veronicastrum (headache, pain in right hypochondrium; very small dose).

  Bile, Insufficient (constipation with light-colored stools): • Achillea • Alnus rubra • Andr
ographis • Apocynum androsaemifolium (grey stool; no willpower; minute or grey stools) • Arctium • Artemisia absinthium • Artemisia vulgaris • Berberis • Chelidonium (warming, bitter) • Chionanthus (gallstone caught in duct, blocking bile; fatty stools) • Cnicus • Crataegus • Curcuma • CYNARA • Euonymus • Fumaria (spasm of bile duct) • Iris (chronic obstruction of bile duct) • JUGLANS CINEREA • Juglans nigra • Larrea • Leptandra • Mahonia (fatty stools, nausea, sick headache) • Petasites (neurodystonia) • Podophyllum (grey or whitish stool, lack of bile; very small dose) • Rhamnus • Rumex crispus • Salvia • Taraxacum (root) • Veronicastrum (torpid liver and bowels; small dose, with Zingiberis to prevent spasm).

  Bile, alternating insufficiency and excess: • Agrimonia (needs confirmation) • Betonica (“autonomic nervous system mis-signaling gall bladder; alternates between biliousness and lack of appetite”—Donahue).

  Inflammation of the Gall Bladder (Cholecystitis): • Achillea • Agrimonia (gastric sub-acidity; tea) • Berberis (cold tea) • Chamomilla (concentrated decoction of dried herb, to increase bitterness) • Chelidonium (heating and stimulating; depressed tissue state; pain in right hypochondrium to scapula) • Chelone • Chionanthus (sharp, cutting pain in right hypochondrium; bile-duct catarrh; with acute liver congestion) • Cichorium • Dioscorea • EUONYMUS • Gentiana • IRIS (profuse yellowish, sometimes greenish diarrhea) • Linum (flaxseed oil) • Mahonia (with catarrhal gastritis) • Mentha piperita (between attacks, to relax) • Myrica • PEUMUS • PODOPHYLLUM (miniscule or homeopathic doses) • Rumex crispus • Silybum • TARAXACUM (long-term usage; root) • Veronicastrum (acute; small doses).

  Gallstones, Gallstone Colic: • AGRIMONIA (tension, gasping for breath) • Alchemilla arvensis • Ajuga reptans • Anisum (mucus congestion of gall bladder) • Apium (debilitated) • BERBERIS (acute pain radiating to all parts of the abdomen) • Betonica (weak gall-bladder reflexes) • Chamomilla (with poppy seeds, poultice on gall-bladder area for the pain) • CHELIDONIUM (thins bile, stimulates and warms gall bladder) • Chelone (pain downwards from xiphoid process to umbilicus) • CHIONANTHUS (preventative and active) • Cichorium • Collinsonia (combine with Eupatorium purpureum) • CURCUMA (anti-inflammatory; combine with a little pepper) • DIOSCOREA • Equisetum (compress) • Eupatorium purpureum • Euonymus • FUMARIA • Hydrastis (anti-inflammatory) • IRIS (sharp pains, congestion, constipation) • JUGLANS CINEREA (preventive; purges the gall bladder of stones and bile very effectively) • Linum (flaxseed oil and apple used as a flush) • Malus (softens stones) • Monarda fistulosa (colic with nervous tension) • PEUMUS (pain in liver or gall bladder) • Pimpinella anisum (mucus mixed with stones) • Podophyllum (full, sallow, puffy, congested face, skin, and gall bladder; very small dose) • Polymnia (congestion) • Rubia • Rumex crispus (in hot conditions) • Silybum (enlargement, uneasiness, nausea, distention) • TARAXACUM (slowly cleans heat and congestion in liver and gall bladder) • Verbascum • Veronicastrum (pain under right hypochondrium and scapula) • VERBENA (pain).

  Neonatal Jaundice: • Myrica (breastfeeding mother should take) • Nux vomica (homeopathic; breastfeeding mother should take).

  Jaundice: • Anisum (mucoid—Light) • Chelidonium • Chelone (with inflammation) • Chionanthus (liver enlargement) • Fumaria (spasmodic) • Hydrastis • Iris (clay-colored stool) • Juglans cinerea • Myrica • Podophyllum (full, sallow, puffy, congested face, skin, and gall bladder; very small dose) • Rumex crispus • Taraxacum • Veronicastrum.

  FORMULARY

  Betonica—with Chamomilla, Dioscorea, “for autonomic mis-signaling of the gall bladder”—Donahue.

  Chionanthus—with Chelidonium, Podophyllum (½-part). This is “Dr. Carroll’s Liver Formula,” given by Les Moore 2002, 21. This and the following are really gall bladder remedies, not liver formulae.

  Chionanthus—with Hydrastis, Gentiana, and a fraction of Rhamnus purshiana (“Clymer’s Liver Formula”). Les Moore 2002, 25.

  Chionanthus—with Chelidonium, Hydrastis (gall bladder stimulant). Old pharmacy recipe.

  Cynara—with Artemisia absinthium (“all kinds of cholecystopathies”). Sherman.

  Peumus—with Ceanothus (gallstones). Sherman.

  The Golden Arc

  The duodenum, liver, gallbladder, pancreas, and portal vein work in harmony to form a functional unit providing the necessary inputs for healthy operation of the stomach and intestines. The liver receives the food/toxins assimilated from the small intestine through the portal vein, and makes the bile, which is in turn supplied in a timely fashion back to the intestines by the gall bladder. The bile is joined in the common bile duct by digestive enzymes manufactured in the pancreas. The portal vein drains all these structures to make sure that toxins (their name is Legion) in the tract are attended to by the liver.

  These functions are coordinated through the autonomic nervous system, with hormonal assistance here and there, so that they function as a unit (underneath the radar of consciousness), though not as a single organ or system. I call this “the golden arc.” We need to learn to think of this group of organs as a unit, and attend to it wisely to keep it functioning smoothly and harmoniously.

  The gall bladder is a sort of “flagship” for the golden arc—perhaps the “meeting of the ways” where all these organs and their influences and disharmonies come to bear. When there is trouble in the autonomic the problem usually shows up in the gall bladder and ducts.

  Pancreas and Sugar Metabolism

  The pancreas is both an exocrine and an endocrine gland, excreting digestive enzymes and secreting the hormones insulin and glucagon, which control blood-sugar levels. Diabetes type I occurs when the pancreas no longer secretes insulin; it is therefore treated by insulin supplementation, and known as “insulin-dependent diabetes.” This condition is incurable (except by surgery), and no herbal practitioner should ever interfere with biomedical treatment.

  Diabetes type II occurs when cells no longer take up insulin and blood sugar, even if they are in adequate supply; it is therefore called “insulin resistance.” This type of diabetes can be improved by exercise, diet, and herbs. Type I diabetics often become type II diabetics after many years, because of the cells’ difficulty in assimilating artificial insulin. These symptoms can be treated—but patients must not be taken off their type-I drug regimen.

  Pre-diabetes precedes diabetes type II. People experiencing the former often need cooling and sedative remedies to bring down the exaggerated metabolism brought on by the excess glucose; for the latter, stimulants and astringents to control excess urination. Stevia may be used as a sugar substitute.

  Hyperglycemia (temporary high blood sugar, usually after a meal), Pre-diabetes: • CINNAMOMUM (dietary or medicinal) • GALEGA (before meals; moderates sugar spikes; long-term use) • Glycyrrhiza (stabilizes blood-sugar levels) • Grifola • IRIS (blood sugar fluctuates up and down, often from leaky gut) • Ocimum • Olea • Oplopanax • Panax quinquefolius (lowers sugar spike after meals; root or leaf) • Taraxacum (root) • Trigonella • VACCINIUM MYRTILLUS (fruit).

  Hypoglycemia: • IRIS (sugar-craving, hypoglycemic headaches, depression, blood sugar ups and downs, sometimes due to leaky gut) • Myrica (stimulant to increase receptor-site availability, peripheral circulation) • OPLOPANAX • Panax ginseng (cured root) • RUBUS CANADENSIS (drop in blood sugar causes shakiness, desire to eat; tea—Trilby).

  Diabetes Mellitus type I (Insulin Dependence): • GYMNEMA (regenerates beta cells, increases insulin levels, decreases blood-sugar levels) • VACCINIUM MYRTILLUS (reduces blood-sugar levels; reduces insulin dependency in type I diabetics; adjunctive to insulin; fruit).

  Note: This condition should not be treated by alternative medicine; do not discontinue biomedical treatment under any circumstances. However, after many years, type I diabetics may also become insulin-resistant, and can be helped by the remedies above. But, again, do not change the biomedically prescribed regimen.

&n
bsp; Diabetes Mellitus type II (Insulin Resistance): • Aceticum acidum (cider vinegar) • Achillea • Acorus (bath—Weiss) • Allium cepa (Weiss) • Arctium • Baptisia (externally, on parts that turn black) • Curcuma (tissue regenerative; tissue depression) • Daucus • Eleutherococcus (to reduce stress) • GALEGA (before meals; moderates sugar spikes; long-term use—Dowling) • Gingko (increases cerebral circulation) • Glycyrrhiza (stabilizes blood-sugar levels) • Grifola • Gymnema (palliates by elevating insulin levels, so may worsen underlying condition) • Helonias • Hydrastis (stimulant used externally on ulcers and neuropathy of extremities; “functional hypergluconeogenesis”—M. Moore) • Hydrangea • Inula • Juniperus • Lycopus • Mahonia (see Hydrastis) • MOMORDICA CHARANTIA (traditional in Asia, Africa; reduces taste for sweets; lowers blood-sugar levels) • Myrica (increases circulation) • Ocimum (lowers blood-sugar levels) • OPLOPANAX (overweight, with high triglycerides, cholesterol, and blood pressure) • Opuntia (juice) • OSMORHIZA LONGISTYLIS (stabilizes sugar levels and reduces symptoms; usually does not cure; for deterioration of eyesight, neuropathy) • Panax quinquefolius (moderates sugar spikes after meals; root, leaf) • Phaseolus (dried pod tea) • RHUS SPP. (diabetic retinopathy, neuropathy, excessive urination and sweating: lowers blood-sugar levels—traditional and proven) • Rubus canadensis • SYZYGIUM (“In all cases of diabetes, 10–15 drops in a little water, 3–4x/day. If the blood sugar is very high, 30 drops may be given every 3 hours. This should be given along with any other medicines given to tackle the disease”—A.K. Bhattacharya; beginning type-II cases) • Taraxacum (maintains sugar levels) • TRIGONELLA (daily tea to reduce blood-sugar levels) • Urtica (for the kidneys; seed) • VACCINIUM MYRTILLUS (reduces blood-sugar levels; to reduce insulin use in type I; adjunctive to insulin) • Vaccinium macrocarpon • VERBENA (congestion in abdomen, high blood pressure of diabetes) • Vinca • VITIS (diabetic retinopathy; seed extract).