Gemmotherapy
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Gemmotherapy [from Lat. gemma, bud, and New Lat. therapīa, Grk. therapeia, medical treatment] is a form of herbal medicine that uses remedies made principally from the embryonic tissue of various trees and shrubs (the buds and emerging shoots), but also from the reproductive parts (the seeds and catkins) and from newly grown tissue (the rootlets and the cortex of rootlets). In two instances, remedies are also made from the sap.
This raw material is taken at the peak time of the tree or shrub’s annual germination, in the spring for buds or the autumn for seeds. Certain plant hormones and enzymes are released during this process, and in some cases are only present in the plant at this time.
Gemmotherapy, like many other alternative therapies, lacks an evidential basis and is not accepted as an efficacious treatment by the scientific community.
Development and spread of gemmotherapy
The therapeutic effects of remedies made from the embryonic material of plants were first investigated in the late 1950s by a Belgian doctor, Dr. Pol Henry (1918–88), working with a group of French homeopaths and biotherapists including Dr. Max Tétau (1927-2012) and Dr. O.A. Julian (1910–84).
Gemmotherapy is included in herbal therapies in France in the Pharmacopée Francaise[1] in 1965).
Literature
Some research has been published in English, for example in the Journal of Ethnopharmacology.[2][non-primary source needed]
References
- ^ Pharmacopée Francaise, 8th edition, Ministère de la Santé, Gouvernement Français, Paris 1965
- ^ Hoefler, C., Fleurentin, J., Mortier, F., Pelt, J.M. and Guillemain J., Comparative choleritic and hepato-protective properties of young shoots and whole plant extracts of Rosmarinus officinalis in rats. Journal of Ethnopharmacology, No. 19, 1987, pp 133-143