Folk names: Blood grass, hard hay, grass of Jesus' wounds, wounds.
Parts used: aboveground part of the plant.
Pharmacy Name: Hyperici herba (formerly Herba Hyperici), Hyperici oleum (formerly Oleum Hyperici).
Botanical description. Perennial plant, 25-40 cm high. In the upper part of the stem will branch abundantly. Leaves are supple, elliptical or ovate, up to 1.5-3 cm long, all-edged, uncut, with translucent points of oil glands. Five-membered golden-yellow flowers are collected in a paniculate inflorescence. St. John's wort has three unusual features that facilitate its identification. Firstly, it has a dip-sided stem, which is very rare among the plants, the grasses have, as a rule, a rounded or tetrahedral stem. Secondly, if you look at the young leaves against the light, they are visible to the light small dots, as if the plant is pierced. These are places of glands with light secrets - a mixture of essential oil and resin. Third, yellow flowers, if rubbed between the fingers, change their color to blood red. Blossoms from July to September. St. John's wort is very common in Europe. It grows along the roadsides, embankments, on wastelands and forest glades, in bushes.
Collection and preparation. St. John's wort is harvested when it is fully blossomed (on Ivanovo day - June 24). They cut it near the ground, bundle it up and dry it out in the shady air.
Acting substances: essential oils, flavonoids (rutin, quercitrin, hyperoside), resins, tannins and rhodans. However, the most important active substance is hypericumroticin, which is also called hypericumrotic. Flobophenes are also worth mentioning.
Healing effect and application. Components of this plant in its entirety excite the activity of digestive (as well as bile-excretory) organs and tone the blood circulation. Hypericin has a slightly soothing effect, affects depression, especially related to menopause. In the treatment of St. John's wort you can see a clear improvement in mental state after 4-6 weeks. Therefore, St. John's wort can be considered as a plant antidepressant. However, it does not work so hard that they can treat real, severe endogenous depression, especially climacteric. However, in so-called symptomatic and reactive depression, St. John's Wort can largely replace chemicals. In vegetative dystonia, it can be used as a supplement to other measures. Interestingly, this healing plant also treats night urinary incontinence. This is understandable, as urinary incontinence is often based on a depressed state of mind.
Tea from St. John's wort: 2 teaspoons with the top of the grass pour 1/4 liters of water and heat to boil. In a few minutes, strain. Dosage: 2-3 cups of tea a day. Treatment with this tea should be carried out systematically for several weeks. Since St. John's wort increases the sensitivity to light, direct sunlight should be avoided during the treatment if possible. For external use it is better to use St. John's wort oil. It is successfully used as a rubbing in rheumatism and gunshot (lumbago), to heal wounds, relieve pain in tendon tension, dislocations, hemorrhages and shingles.
The German Public Health Service only gives indications for the use of St. John's wort in the form of tea, nervous anxiety and sleep disturbance, as well as dyspepsia; for oil - as an external remedy - muscle pain (myalgia), wounds and burns.
St. John's wort oil: for 1/g of oil you need to take 25 g of raw materials. Fresh, newly blossomed flowers are pressed or pushed in the mortar and gently rubbed. Then add 500 g of olive oil, stirred and poured into a wide neck white glass bottle, which is first left unclosed. In a warm place the mixture wanders (from time to time it is stirred). When the fermentation is over in 3-5 days, the bottle is closed and kept in the sun until the content becomes bright red - about 6 weeks later. Then the oil is separated from the water layer and stored in well-closing bottles. St. John's wort oil can also be used inside (1 teaspoon 2 times a day) as a mild choleretic agent or to soothe an irritated stomach on nerve soil.
Use in homeopathy. For preparation of homeopathic means Hypericum use all blossoming plant. It is given to ease the condition after concussion, depression of various nature and nervous pain after injuries.
Application in folk medicine. In folk medicine, as well as in science, St. John's wort is used primarily for the treatment of wounds and pain, then in the treatment of diseases of the lungs, stomach, intestines and gall bladder, diarrhea and nervous disorders. Tea, oil, and alcoholic extract (infusion) are used equally, which is used to disinfect wounds.
Tincture of St. John's wort: 10 g of dried grass pour 50 g 70 96-nose alcohol and insist 10 days. After about