Useful and medicinal properties of thistle spotted( sharp-motley)

Milk thistle is a one- or two-year-old plant with a spindle-shaped root, a herbaceous plant of the Astro family, up to 150 cm high. In the first year it develops numerous basal prickly leaves, in the second year forms a powerful, slightly branching stem.

Leaves oblong-oval, large, dark green, with transverse wavy white divorces, leaves are leathery, with white transverse, wavy, interrupted bands, lower - on petioles, middle and upper - sessile, stalk-enveloping, leaf plate oblong, wavy, with jagged prickly lobes along the edge, spines long, strong, yellow along the margin, with yellow spines.

Flowers are tubular, lilac-malignant or purple. Flowers are collected in large globular baskets, surrounded by spiny leaves of the wrapper;corollas only tubular, purplish-purple, of filiform petals;achenes about 5 mm long, ribbed-wrinkled, white-spotted, with a tuft. Blooms all summer.

Fruits - shiny achenes with a tuft, yellow, with dark oblong stains. Blossoms from July to late autumn, the fruits ripen in September-October.

Grows on vacant lots, sometimes it is bred in vegetable gardens.

Homeland - South and Atlantic Europe. Distributed in Western Europe, Asia Minor, North Africa, America, southern Australia, as well as in the southern parts of the European part of the former USSR, the Caucasus, southern West Siberia and Central Asia. Introduced into culture.

Medicinal raw materials are seeds. They are collected in the early morning, dried, cleaned and stored in a well-ventilated room. Raw materials contain up to 32% fatty oil, essential oil, tar, mucus, biogenic amines( tyramine, histamine), flavonolignans up to 3.8%( silibin, silidianin, taxifolin, silichristine), trace elements( copper, zinc, selenium, nickel, boronand etc.).The presence of a complex of silymarin( a mixture of three flavonolignans) determines the healing properties of the plant. Even in high concentrations, silymarin is free from side effects and has an extremely good effect on liver repair.

Therapeutic use of

The fruit is used for medicinal purposes. As a tincture, they are part of the drug "Choleletin No. 1" for the treatment of gallstone disease.

Earlier the fruits were sharply variegated used in medicine for diseases of the liver and spleen, bile-stone disease, jaundice and chronic cough.

In folk medicine, milk thistle is recommended for inflammation of the liver, bile ducts and spleen, colic caused by gallstones and sand, jaundice, hemorrhoids and constipation as a bitter tonic.

A powerful impetus to the study of this plant was the work of German scientists H. Wagner and V. Dogen, who isolated from the fruits of milk thistle the biologically active substances - flavonolignans, which contribute to complexation in Kupffer cells of the liver, which creates a hepatoprotective effect for any exo- and endotoxic effecton the body.

Recent experiments in animals have shown that the treatment of milk thistle weakens or completely suppresses the action of irritating and damaging substances. Experimented even with the most dangerous hepatic poison - the poison of green mushroom, the results of the experiment were successful. The received results of researches allow to not doubt, that the milk thistle has protective and regenerating action on a liver.

Form of application

Firstly in Germany, then in Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and other countries, preparations of the hepatoprotector action - silymarin( FRG), legal( Yugoslavia), karsil( Bulgaria), silibor( Ukraine), silimar( Russia) andetc. All these drugs are allowed for use in the form of dragees or tablets with chronically persistent and chronically aggressive hepatitis, with liver cirrhosis, toxic-meta-bolic lesions of the liver, as a means of protecting hepatocytes of the liver under the influence of hepatotoxieskih factors.

In Germany, the preparation of Mariacon, containing silymarin from milk thistle, extracts of large celandine, madder of dye, St. John's wort, etc., is also available. In addition to silymarin, it also contains extracts of dandelion and some other plants.

Unfortunately, the domestic chemical and pharmaceutical industry produces an insufficient number of hepatoprotective drugs, despite the fact that in the NGO "VILAR"( Moscow), domestic preparations of silimar, sibektan and eraxol have been developed.

Experimental and clinical studies objectively confirmed the protective property of milk thistle in liver damage, which is due to the silymarin contained in it.

Natural products of milk thistle( seeds, extracts of fruits and plants, powder, flour) have a pronounced therapeutic effect in case of diffuse liver damage, including alcoholic genesis, improve the contractile capacity of the gallbladder, stop the dyspeptic syndrome.

Given that patients with eczema, especially in its chronic form, and atopic dermatitis often reveal certain diseases of the liver, bile ducts, drugs can and have a certain therapeutic effect when combined diseases of the two systems - skin and liver( Korsun, Kubanova, Sokolov, 1998).Milk thistle preparations are especially shown for patients with occupational eczema caused by compounds of arsenic, vanadium, chromium, nickel, zinc, copper, formalin and other exogenous occupational factors often found in metallurgical, chemical, woodworking, etc.

Given the presence of allergic diseases in many patientsskin pathology of the digestive system, violations of the detoxification and bile excretory functions of the liver, along with conventional complex therapy, used carpsil 2 tablets andCarbonene 1,5 g in grated form with mineral waters Smirnovskaya, Truskavetskaya patient with allergodermatosis.

In the treatment of 104 patients with eczema, this method was used to determine the termination of wetness for 2 to 3 days, to stop the appearance of new lesions on the 6th to 7th day, and to resolve infiltration on the 16th-18th day. Favorable results were noted in all patients.

Although in most cases preference is given to ready-made preparations, it is very useful for people with a sick or sensitive liver to exchange course tea from milk thistle. Take 1 teaspoon of seeds, pour a glass of boiling water, insist 20 minutes and filter. Tea is drunk hot, in small sips, 1 cup in the morning on an empty stomach, half an hour before lunch and in the evening, before going to bed. Tea made from milk thistle can be mixed with tea from peppermint - this not only improves the taste, but in many cases increases the effect.

Given the considerable density of the shell of acanthocephala seedlings, it is desirable to use their broth - 30 g of powdered seeds are boiled in a water bath in 0.5 l of water until the volume of the broth is reduced by half, drink a tablespoon every hour.

The Department of Pharmacology and Biochemistry of the Samara Medical University conducts scientific research on the use of products and preparations from milk thistle both in curative and in preventive practice. Samara produces bakery products called "Health" with the addition of powdered milk thistle, as well as tincture and vodka "Milk thistle".

On the basis of a number of clinical departments of the Central Clinical Hospital of the Ministry of Railways of Russia, a clinical trial was carried out of the food additive "Mariol" developed by the scientific and production company "Mariol" with a view to the widest possible introduction of products aimed at improving the population.

In the chemotherapy department of the Center of Oncology of Railway Transport, against the backdrop of polychemotherapy of cancer of various localizations, the food additive "Mariol" was prescribed 1 tablespoon per day. Its purpose allowed not to notice such symptoms as nausea, vomiting, dyspepsia, stomatitis, changes in peripheral blood parameters when taking platinum and anthracycline preparations, which is an important point in the prevention of cancer recurrence and metastasis.

Thus, milk thistle preparations have a pronounced hepatoprotective, choleretic, antispasmodic and anti-inflammatory effect. Food biologically active supplement "Mariol" is suitable as an auxiliary and supporting agent in the complex treatment of liver and gastrointestinal diseases, cancer patients, and also in the preoperative period for various diseases. It can be used as an additional remedy with insufficient function of the hepatobiliary system in patients with dermatoses, in children's practice and in old age.

Application of

Seeds are consumed in the form of broths: 30 g of powdered seeds, boil in 0.5 liters of water until half boil;drink 1 tbsp.spoon every hour.

Dry powder from seeds take 4-5 times a day for 1 tsp.