Arnica montana (leopard's bane, mountain tobacco, mountain arnica)

Category: Medicines - plant based

Type

Voluntary

Introduction and description

Arnica montana, commonly called leopard's bane, mountain tobacco and mountain arnica, is a European flowering plant in the sunflower - Asteraceae – family.  Botanical synonyms include:

• Doronicum montanum Lam.
• Doronicum oppositifolium Lam.
• Arnica helvetica Loudon
• Arnica petiolata Schur
• Arnica plantaginifolia Gilib.
• Arnica lowii Holm
• Cineraria cernua Thore

Arnica contains a number of chemicals that are chelating agents – of the soil.  Thus potentially Arnica may be a very useful bioremedial plant.

Distribution

Arnica montana is widespread across most of Europe, although it is absent from the British Isles and the Italian and Balkan Peninsulas. It grows in nutrient-poor siliceous meadows up to nearly 3,000 metres (9,800 ft). It is rare overall, but may be locally abundant. It is becoming rarer, particularly in the north of its distribution, largely due to increasingly intensive agriculture. In more upland regions, it may also be found on nutrient-poor moors and heaths.

It is a wild perennial, but can be and is cultivated.  Arnica thrives in a mixture of loam, peat, and sand. It may be propagated by root division or from seed.

Description

The leaves of Arnica montana form a flat rosette, from the centre of which rises a flower stalk, 1 to 2 feet high, bearing the flowers.

Most of the leaves are in a basal rosette, but one or two pairs may be found on the stem and are, unusually for composites, opposite.

The flower heads are yellow, approximately 5 cm (2.0 in) in diameter, and appear from May to August.

The rhizome is dark brown, cylindrical, usually curved, and bears brittle wiry rootlets on the under surface.

Medicinal Uses

Arnica montana has historically been used as medicine, but traditionally it has always been used externally or in extremely tiny homeopathic doses of a carefully prepared tincture of only some parts of the plant. 

Mrs Grieve mentions one very intriguing use:

we assume here that Mrs Grieve is referring to the flower extract, although it is not that clear in her explanation.

Clinical trials

Clinical trials on Arnica have been very unsatisfactorily handled in the main, meaning the results tend to be meaningless. 

In the olden days, as Mrs Grieve says, it was used to ‘bring out a bruise’.  It probably did this via its effect on the immune system as at low doses it is an immunostimulant.  But all sorts of uses are being tested. 

It has been tested for treating osteoarthritis. It predictably failed.  Predictably, because in the first place osteoarthritis is caused by a pathogen, as such external remedies will have no healing effect, and secondly Arnica was not traditionally used for skeletal pain relief. 

Arnica is used homeopathically internally, but homeopathy requires considerable dilution of a tincture prepared from only some of the plant.  There is [or should be] a choice of two -  the British Pharmacopoeia Tincture of the root, and the United States Pharmacopoeia Tincture of the flowers.  Each does different things.

It appears that in the USA, where one such trial was conducted, that not only is the concept of homeopathy not understood, or the idea that different parts of the plant can do different things,  but the tincture was not used – I quote “three pills of Arnica were taken per day”.  The result, as you can imagine, was not a great success.

Given that Arnica montana contains helenalin, which can be poisonous, this was an unnecessarily risky experiment with people’s lives. Helenalin produces severe gastroenteritis and internal bleeding of the digestive tract if enough material is ingested.  We quote from the analysis of Dr Duke:

 

• An inotrope is an agent that alters the force or energy of muscular contractions. Negatively inotropic agents weaken the force of muscular contractions. Positively inotropic agents increase the strength of muscular contraction.  The heart is a muscle, hence there is the potential here – at the wrong doses to cause arrhythmias or even heart attacks.
• A Sympathomimetic is an agent that causes a 'flight and fight' response, - adrenaline, perspiration, heart racing –this can happen when we are being poisoned, as such this is simply confirmation that this plant is not exactly safe.  Quotes such as these “used as a decoction or tincture it stimulates the circulation and is valuable in the treatment of angina and a weak or failing heart” [Chevallier. A. The Encyclopedia of Medicinal Plants] are downright dangerous as the only reason the circulation is racing is because we are not well. The word Cardiotoxic should be born in mind here.
• Paralytic, is self explanatory.

At homeopathically low doses Helenalin, according to Dr Duke, is an Immunostimulant [ED42=1 uM], in effect it kick starts the immune system.

Rhizome

The rhizome of Arnica contains Formic acid and according to Dr Duke

 

So toxic if ingested, which is why the tincture containing the root is not ingested.  Note that this analysis shows the antiseptic, and counterirritant [irritant at high doses] nature of formic acid, and shows why its external use has some benefits.

Flower

The flower has some extremely interesting activities, - antiviral, antibacterial and antiparasitic.  As Mrs Grieve says “In the North American colonies the flowers are used in preference to the rhizome”.

Having said this, the ingestion of the flowers in any quantity would also be very unwise – the flowers not only contain the aforementioned Helenalin, but also Gallic acid which can damage the kidneys at high doses; and thymol which is ‘Enterotoxic’, again at the wrong doses - the prefix entero- refers to the intestine (from Greek ἔντερον, enteron). However it can also be used for cells not found in the intestine like Gastric enteroendocrine cells and Pancreatic enteroendocrine cells.

Before we get too worked up about the presence of thymol etc, the key is the dose.  Thymol is in thyme and does us no harm, but if we start to make pills of the flowers or use essential oils or high concentration extracts, we are heading for trouble.  As Mrs Grieve says

The old Eastern bloc countries are making a new and vital contribution to the study of plants like Arnica and are interestingly carrying out more research on some of the little studied activities of the plant.  For example

.

References and further reading

• Platelets. 2015;26(2):168-76. doi: 10.3109/09537104.2014.894970. Epub 2014 Mar 28.  Comparison of cytotoxic and anti-platelet activities of polyphenolic extracts from Arnica montana flowers and Juglans regia husks.  Rywaniak J1, Luzak B, Podsedek A, Dudzinska D, Rozalski M, Watala C.  1Department of Haemostasis and Haemostatic Disorders, Central Veterans' Hospital, Medical University of Lodz , Lodz , Poland

Related observations

Healing observations

• Arnica - The Healing power of herbs – Ceres Esplan 019734
• Dr Duke's list of Chemicals and their Biological Activities in: Arnica montana L. (Asteraceae) -- Leopard's-Bane, Mountain Tobacco 019735
• Effect of homeopathic Arnica montana on bruising in face-lifts: results of a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial 019737
• Evaluation of antioxidant and cytoprotective activities of Arnica montana L. and Artemisia absinthium L. ethanolic extracts 019736
• Homeopathy for Collective Diseases - AIDs, Malaria, Trauma, Vaccines and Toxins - The quest for a collective simillimum 012621
• Mrs Grieve on Arnica 019738

In time

Synaesthesia, Pure or enhanced perception, Inter composer communication, Vision, Dream, Perception recall, Exploring group perception

• Danielou, Alain – On drugs you are possessed by the spirit being of the drug 022582
• Homeopathy for Collective Diseases - AIDs, Malaria, Trauma, Vaccines and Toxins - The quest for a collective simillimum 012621