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| Latin: |
Radix Cynanchi Atrati |
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| Origin: |
Swallowwort root is the root and rhizome of the perennial plant Cynanchum atratum Bunge (blackend swallowwort), or Cynanchum versicolor Bunge (versicolorous swallowwort), of the Asclepiadaceae family. Native to east Asia, it is grown in the mountains all over China and Japan. In China, it is distributed North and South, particularly in Liaoning, Hebei, Henan, Shandong, Shanxi, Anhui, etc.
The perennial climber grows to about 0.6 m high. The flowers are hermaphrodite (have both male and female organs) and are pollinated by insects. The plant can grow in semi-shade (light woodland) or no shade. It requires moist soil.
The herb is harvested in autumn, then the root is dried in the sun for use. |
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| Properties: |
| Bitter and salty in flavor, cold in nature, it is related to the stomach and liver channels. |
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| Functions: |
| Clears away heat to cool the blood, induces diuresis to treat strangury (slow and painful spasmodic discharge of urine) and removes toxic substances to heal boils. |
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| Applications: |
1. To treat fever due to yin deficiency and postpartum fever of the deficiency type as a result of the entry of pathogenic heat into the blood:
(A) High fever with excessive thirst and coma with a crimson tongue due to the entry of pathogenic warmth into the blood system:
Use it with raw rehmannia, Zhejiang figwort root (Radix Scrophulariae), etc.
(B) Fever due to yin deficiency and hectic or tidal fever as a result of unexhausted latent heat:
Use it with raw rehmannia, windweed rhizome (Rhizoma Anemarrhenae), sweet wormwood (Herba Artemisiae Chinghao), etc.
(C) Such ailments as postpartum fever due to blood deficiency, night fever with morning chills, prolonged low fever, syncope (loss of consciousness resulting from insufficient blood flow to the brain), etc.:
Use it with Chinese angelica, ginseng and licorice, e.g., Baiwei Tang, in order to jointly achieve the effects of nourishing the blood, replenishing yin, clearing away heat and relieving hectic fever.
2. To treat strangury due to heat and strangury complicated by hematuria (blood in urine):
Use it with five-leaf akebia stem (Caulis Akebiae), talcum, pyrrosia leaf, etc.
3. To treat skin and external diseases and sore throat due to exuberant toxic blood-heat and such ailments as snake bite:
4. Miscellaneous:
This herb can clear and purge heat from the lungs and expel it from the body.
It can be used to treat such ailments as coughing due to lung heat, affection by exopathogens due to yin deficiency, fever with a dry throat and vexation with thirst, etc. |
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| Dosage and Administration: |
3-12 g.
Decoct the herb and the other ingredients for drinking. |
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| Cautions on Use: |
| Swallowwort root should be avoided by those deficient in spleen-yang or with poor appetite and loose stools. |
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| Reference Materials: |
Shen Nong's Herbal Classic : "To treat sudden apoplexy, fever with fullness sensation of the limbs, sudden loss of consciousness, mania due to pathogenic factors, chills and fever with soreness and pains and occasional attacks of pyrexial malaria."
Other Medical Records of Famous Physicians : "To treat strangury due to impairment of the stomach and spleen."
The Compendium of Materia Medica : "Wind-warm syndrome, scorching fever, drowsiness, strangury caused by heat, enuresis and bleeding wounds." |
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| Toxic or Side Effects: |
| There are some reports of toxins in this genus. |
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| Modern Researches: |
Swallowwort root contains volatile oil, cardiac glycoside, etc.
For self protection, the outer skin (bark) of many plants contains volatile oil, which in turn has elements that serve as an immediate chemical defense against herbivores and pathogens. How? There is an element called hydroxynitrile glucoside in volatile oil. This element will release toxic hydrogen cyanide by endogenous plant glucosidase upon tissue disruption (see Anne Vinther Morant, Kirsten Jorgensen, Charlotte Jorgensen, Suzanne Michelle Paquette, Raquel Sanchez-Perez, Birger Lindberg Moller, and Soren Bak, "beta-Glucosidases as Detonators of Plant Chemical Defense," Phytochemistry Vol. 69, Issue 9 (June 2008), pp. 1,795-1,813).
Glucosidase is a catalyzing enzyme that improves healthy functions of our body. It is a lipase that decomposes fat; it can also check inflammation and improve memory (see Mikako Sakurai, Masayuki Sekiguchi, Ko Zushida, Kazuyuki Yamada, Satoshi Nagamine, Tomohiro Kabuta and Keiji Wada, "Reduction in memory in passive avoidance learning, exploratory behaviour and synaptic plasticity in mice with a spontaneous deletion in the ubiquitin C-terminal hydrolase L1 gene," European Journal of Neuroscience Vol. 27, Issue 3 (February 2008), pp. 691-701).
Swallowwort root can strengthen myocardial contraction.
The root is depurative (purifies the blood), diuretic and febrifuge (removes fever).
The stem is antitussive (relieves cough) and sialagogue (promotes the flow of saliva). |
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