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The rootstock, the part
used medicinally, is spindle-shaped and has a knotty crown, slightly but
distinctly annulate, the remainder longitudinally wrinkled.
The dried root as found in commerce is usually in cut or broken pieces of
variable size, 1 to 6 inches long and about 3/4 inch in thickness,
externally pale orange-brown, becoming greyish-brown when kept long,
internally whitish. It is tough and has an uneven fracture; the broken
surface is granular; that of the bark is short and brittle. The wood is
yellowish, with large white medullary rays. The drug is almost inodorous,
but has a bitterish and disagreeable, somewhat acrid taste.
The powdered drug is yellowish brown and when examined under the microscope
shows numerous simple or 2 to 4 compound starch grains, also calcium oxalate
crystals.
The Western Indians boil the tubers for food, prepare a crude sugar from the
flowers and eat the young seed-pods, after boiling them, with buffalo meat.
Some of the Canadian tribes use the young shoots as a potherb, after the
manner of asparagus.
Constituents
The root contains a
glucosidal principle, Asclepiadin, which occurs as an amorphous body, is
soluble in ether, alcohol and hot water. It also contains several resins,
and odorous fatty matter, and a trace of volatile oil. It yields not more
than 9 per cent of ash.
Medicinal Action and Uses
Antispasmodic, diaphoretic,
expectorant, tonic, carminative and mildly cathartic.
From early days this Asclepias has been regarded as a valuable medicinal
plant. It is one of the most important of the indigenous American remedies,
and until lately was official in the United States Pharmacopoeia.
It possesses a specific action on the lungs, assisting expectoration,
subduing inflammation and exerting a general mild tonic effect on the
system, making it valuable in all chest complaints. It is of great use in
pleurisy, mitigating the pain and relieving the difficulty of breathing, and
is also recommended in pulmonary catarrh. It is extensively used in the
Southern States in these cases, also in consumption, in doses of from 20
grains to a drachm in a powder, or in the form of a decoction.
It has also been used with great advantage in diarrhoea, dysentery and acute
and chronic rheumatism, in low typhoid states and in eczema. It is claimed
that the drug may be employed with benefit in flatulent colic and
indigestion, but in these conditions it is rarely used.
In large doses it acts as an emetic and purgative.
A teacupful of the warm infusion (1 in 30) taken every hour will powerfully
promote free perspiration and suppressed expectoration. The infusion may be
prepared by taking 1 teaspoonful of the powder in a cupful of boiling water.
The decoction is taken in doses of 2 to 3 fluid ounces.
The dose of the fluid extract is 1/2 to 1 drachm; of Asclepin, 1 to 4
grains.
A much-recommended herbal recipe is: Essence of composition powder, 1 oz.;
fluid extract of Pleurisy Root, 1 oz. Mix and take a teaspoonful three or
four times daily in warm sweetened water.
It is often combined with Angelica and Sassafras for producing perspiration
in fever and pleurisy and for equalizing the circulation of the blood.
Not to be used during pregnancy.
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