A popular, beautifully flowering, tall perennial with a pubescent stem and a slightly "spiky" name, which in Greek means "hedgehog", is a purple echinacea. Flowers, stem, leaves and root of this plant are used for medicinal purposes by folk and official medicine. Ready-made alcohol tincture of echinacea can be bought at pharmacies. But no less useful are decoctions and water infusions from all parts of the plant, as well as herbal tea, for the preparation of which flowers are used.
Echinacea, whose healing properties are manifested in the activation of the body's protective (immune) forces against colds, has proven its antibacterial and antiviral effects. Its preparations facilitate the course of common infectious diseases, such as tonsillitis and influenza. With the help of a plant with life-giving bactericidal power, otitis media, stomatitis, bronchitis, inflammation of the genitourinary organs, psoriasis, eczema, burns, and wounds are treated. Phytotherapeutists recommend using echinacea preparations orally for overwork, hepatitis, prostatitis, impotence, and infertility. The plant is used for severe acute and chronic diseases - cerebral meningitis, typhoid fever, diphtheria, osteomyelitis, rheumatoid arthritis.
Who is Echinacea contraindicated for? The flowers and seeds of the plant, which contain essential oil, should be used with caution by people prone to allergies. Do not give drugs to young children under two years of age. It is forbidden to take the plant to pregnant and lactating women.
Where did Echinacea come from and what does it contain
Flowers and other parts of the plant contain biologically active substances. This perennial, which grows in the wild in America and is known as a healer among the Indians, has long moved to other continents. Here he quickly gained popularity. For example, the German Pharmacopoeia uses echinacea to prepare two hundred medicines. The chemical composition of the plant contains bitterness, mucus, resins, flavonoids, tannins, enzymes, oils, vitamins, organic acids, polysaccharides, trace elements, and also a valuable substance with a strong bactericidal effect - echinacoside. The tap root and rhizomes contain inulin, an easily digestible natural substitute for carbohydrates - starch and sugar.
How to prepare a medicine from the plant "Echinacea"
Flowers, stem, leaves, root, seeds - everything is useful for making tea, decoctions, infusions and tinctures - simple and affordable medicines. With a general weakening of immunity - especially in the autumn - drink herb altea, where the only component may be echinacea. How to brew? Boiling water is poured into a cup with two or three flowers, under the lid they are allowed to brew for 10 minutes - and the tea is ready. You can sweeten it with honey, unless, of course, there are carbohydrate metabolism disorders.
To enhance the therapeutic effect, you can prepare a mixture of natural immunomodulators. Take dry grass or echinacea root, licorice root, plantain leaves, mallow flowers, rose hips - all in equal parts. Grind and mix raw materials. For 1 st. l. mixture needs 1 cup boiling water. Tea is infused in a closed cup for 10 minutes. Drink warm in small sips of 1/2 cup 3 times a day.
For a decoction, they usually take dry crushed raw materials (leaves, root, flowers) in the amount of 1 tbsp. l. and pour hot water - 1 glass. Everything should be warmed up for 20 minutes, placed in a water bath, then insisted for an hour. Strain and top up with boiled water to a glass. You need to drink in several doses per day. Treated with echinacea for a month. Then there is a month break. She has no harmful side effects.
In pharmacies they sell an alcoholic tincture of echinacea - it contains the required concentration of the medicinal plant.
