Tubang Bakod (Physic Nut Tree) as Herbal Medicine

Now pantropic.

Chemical
• Seed has a toxic principle, toxalbumin curcin, belonging to the same group as croton and ricin. Comparatively, curcin causes less gastrointestinal irritation. 8 drops of this oil has been reported to cause severe vomiting, followed by diarrhea.
• Bark contains a considerable amount of chlorophyll, reducing sugars or reducing substances, saponin, a small amont of tannin, resin, and a trace of volatile oil. Bark also yields a wax which is a mixture of melissyl alcohol and its melissinic acid ester.
• Latex contains alkaloids: jatrophine, jatropham and curcain with its anti-cancerous properties.
• Leaves yield alkloids, flavonoids, saponins, tannins, phenolic compounds, steroids, terpenoids.
• Leaves contain apigenin, vitexin, isovitexin, etc used for malaria, rheumatic and muscular pains.
• Physic-nut oil consists of glycerides of palmitic, oleic, and linoleic acids.
• Seed contains a yellow fixed oil, 29-40 %, known as Hell oil, Pinhoen oil, Oleum infernale, and Oleum ricini majoris; the activity is greater than castor oil and less that of croton oil. It consists of the glyceride of a characteristic acid, in the same group as ricinoleic and crotonoleic acid, but not identical with either, with an activity greater than castor oil and less than croton oil.

Properties
- Bitter-tart tasting, cooling natured, antipyretic, antispasmodic, anti-vomiting, haemostatic, styptic, suppurative.
- Toxic; observe caution with internal use.
- Roots are emetic and purgative.
- Oil of the seed is a drastic purgative.

Parts utilized
· Fresh leaves.
· Collected the year round.

Uses
· In the Philippines, oil of seeds used as a drastic purgative.
· Decoction of roots used a cure for diarrhea.
· External applications for bleeding, ulceration of wound, pruritus.
· Decoction of leaves or roots used for diarrhea.
· Bark, slightly pounded, placed in the mouth as cure for snake bites; also applied to bites of various animals.
· The leaf decoction is also used as a cough remedy and as galactagogue.
· Poultice of bark used for sprains and dislocations. Sap is used for toothaches.
· Leaves are applied to wounds and pruritic lesions.
· A vigorous massaging of the oil onto the abdomen is believed to be abortifacient..
· Decoction of young leaves taken for fevers.
· Infusion of leaves, hot or cold, mixed with lime juice, used as lotion for fevers.
· Twigs used for cleaning teeth.
· Used for scabies, eczema, and ringworm.
· Juice used for toothaches and strengthening the gums.
· Preparation from root-bark applied to sores.
· Emulsion of sap with benzyl benzoate used for scabies, eczema and dermatitis.
· Roots used as antidote for snake bites.
· In other countries, the seed is used as antihelminthic or abortive; the leaves as insecticidal.
· Roots used as antidote against snake venom; root extract used for bleeding gums.
· White latex used as mouth disinfectant; used externally for piles.
· Fresh, viscid juice from the stem used to arrest bleeding or hemorrhage from wounds, ulcers, cuts, and abrasions; used to promote healing by coagulating blood and forming an air-tight film when dry, similar to that produced by collodion.
· In South Africa, traditionally used as laxative.
· In Gambia, leaves used to make mouthwash.
· In the Gold Coast, leaves used as ingredient in enema preparations.
· In Southern Nigeria, used as remedy for jaundice, applied by rectal injection.
· In Malaya used as rubefacient. Malays use the latex as vulnerary.
· In the Cape Verde Islands, used to stimulate secretion of milk.
· In Cambodia, applied to sores and ulcers; the leaves considered insecticidal; the seeds considered abortifacient.
· In Brazil, used as anthelmintic.
· In Goa, root-bark applied externally for rheumatism. Fresh stems are used as toothbrushes, to strengthen the gums and cure bleeding, spongy gums, or gum boils.
· In Madagascar and Guiana as an anti-diarrhetic; latex is applied to decayed teeth and wounds, and used as styptic; the roots given as emetic and purgative.
· In India, applied as cataplasm to the breasts and as lactagogue. Also, used as styptic.
· In Peru, traditionally used for external wound healing and gastric ulcers.
Others
- Curcas Oil: Used as illuminant and lubricant. Belongs to a class of semidrying oils and used in the manufacture of soaps and candles.

Bayag-Usa as Herbal Medicine

In secondary forests and thickets at lower elevations.

Uses
Reported anti-tumor use.

Kampanilla (Yellow Bell) as Herbal Medicine

Occasionally semi-established in wild in thickets near dwellings or settlements.

Constituents
- Phytochemical studies revealed the main constituents to be alkaloids, flavonoids, saponins and carbohydrates.
- Contains allamandin, a toxic iridoid lactone.
- As the name implies, the leaves, roots and flowers may be used in preparing a powerful cathartic.
- Milky sap is considered antibacterial, possibly anticancer.
- Study of phospholipid fatty acid composition yielded 7-Methyl-5,9-octadecadienoic acid.

Properties
- In the Philippines, whole plant is considered poisonous.
- Purgative, cathartic with hydrogogue effect, healing, diuretic.

Parts utilized:
Leaves and bark.

Uses
- The plant draws its name from Allamand, who made the plant known a century and a half ago, who used a cathartic infusion of the leaves for colic.
- Infusion of leaves in moderate doses is an excellent cathartic; in considerable doses, it is purgative and a violent emetic.
- The bark and latex in small doses are considered cathartic; in large doses, poisonous.
- Decoction of the bark is a hydragogue; infusion of leaves is cathartic.
- Decoction of leaves in small doses used as antidote for poisoning.
- Extract of leaves used for colic and as laxative; in large doses causes diarrhea and vomiting.
- In Trinidad, used for treating malaria and jaundice.
- In Guiana, the latex is used as a purgative and employed for colic.
- In Surinam, the plant is used as a cathartic.

Melon (Cantaloupe) as Herbal Medicine

Cultivated in all warm countries.

Constituents
- Fruit contains dextrose, 1.4 to 2.6%; citric acid, water, 92 to 96%; fat, 0.5 to 0.8%;.
- Seed contains globulin and glutine, arginine, histidine, lysine, cystine, tryptophan, fixed oil, galactan and glucose.
- Oil consists of glycerides of linoleic, oleic, palmitic, stearic and myristic acid; also, lecithin and chloresterin.
- Roots contain nenemetin, potassium malate and pectin.
- Contains an emetic principle.

Properties
- Considered emetic and purgative.
- Fruit, especially the pulp, considered nutritive, demulcent, diuretic and cooling.
- Seeds considered diuretic.
- Kernel considered stomachic, peptic and constructive remedy.

Parts used
Roots, pulp, seeds, kernel.

Uses
- Root considered an effective emetic – one piece in 60 gm of lime water.
- Peduncles used for anasarca and indigestion. In Indo-China, it is employed to arrest vomiting.
- Fruit pulp used as a lotion for chronic and acute eczema; also used for removing tan and freckles; and internally, used for dyspepsia.
- Seeds yield a sweet, edible oil which is nutritive and diuretic, useful for painful discharges and suppression of the urine.
- Fruit pulp also used as diuretic.
- Kernels prescribed for cancer of the stomach and for purulent problems of the digestive tract.
- Kernels used for menorrhagia, after the oil has been extracted.
- In Italy seeds are used as emollient and refreshing medicine.

Kalabasa or Squash as Herbal Medicine

Planted in all warm countries.

Constituents
• Phytochemical screening yielded carbohydrates, steroids, proteins and amino acids.
• Fruit contains fat, 10%; pentosan, 5.2 %; protein, 14.2%; and ash, 9/3%.
• Seeds contain fixed oil, 20-25%; a proteid, edestin. The seed's active principle is a pepo-resin found in the cotyledons.
• Curcurbitin, a constituent in pumpkin seeds has shown anti-parasitic activity in the test tube.
• Seed extract yielded carbohydrates, saponins, and flavonoids.

Properties
• Considered anti-inflammatory, antipyretic, diuretic, tonic, vermifuge.
• Considered antidiabetic, antioxidant, anticarcinogenic.

Parts used
Fruits, seeds, stalk.

Uses:
• In India, fruit pulp is often used as poultice for carbuncles, boils and ulcers.
• Dried pulp, in the form of confection, used as remedy for hemoptysis and hemorrhages from the pulmonary tract.
• For venomous insect bites, the fruit stalk in contact with the ripe gourd is cut, dried, and made into a paste and applied to venomous insect bites, especially centipedes.
• The fresh seeds, pulped or in emulsion, are used as antihelminthic. Seeds are eaten fresh to expel worms from the stomach. For tapeworms, seeds are given with sugar at bedtime, followed with a dose of castor oil in the morning.
• Seed oil used as nervine tonic.
• In Brazil, pumpkin seeds are used for stomach pain, as antiinflammatory, antipyretic and anthelminthic.
• In China, pumpkin seeds have been used for acute schistosomiasis.
• In Thailand, seeds used for kidney stones.
Others
• Seed contains an oil. Used for lighting.
• Fruit can provide a face-mask for dry skins.

Ampalaya (Momordica charantia)

Properties
- Considered astringent, antidiabetic, abortifacient, antirheumatic, contraceptive, galactagogue, parasiticide, anthelmintic, purgative, emetic, antipyretic, febrifuge, emmenagogue, cooling , tonic, vulnerary.
- Fruit considered tonic and stomachic.

Parts utilized
Leaves, roots and fruits.

Uses
- In the Philippines, juice expressed from the green fruit is given for chronic colitis: also used for bacillary dysentery.
- Astringent powdered leaves or root decoction can be applied to hemorrhoids.
- Leaf juice for cough and as a purgative and anthelminthic to expel intestinal parasites, and for healing wounds.
- Seeds also used to expel worms.
- The vine or the juice of leaves used as mild purgative for children.
- In large doses, the fresh juice is a drastic purgative.
- Decoction of roots and seeds used for urethral discharges.
- Juice of leaves used for chronic coughs.
- Leaves and shoots used as vulnerary.
- Sap of leaves used as parasiticide.
- Fruit macerated in oil used as vulnerary.
- Fruit considered tonic and stomachic; used in rheumatism, gout, and diseases of the spleen and liver.
- Pounded leaves used for scalds.
- Infusion of leaves or leaf juice used for fevers.
- Used for chronic stomach ulcers.
- Root sometimes used as ingredient in aphrodisiac preparations.
- Decoction of root used as abortifacient.
- Fruit in large doses considered a drastic purgative and abortifacient.
- In India, root used as astringent; applied externally to hemorrhoids.
- In Lagos, decoction of leaves used as stomachic.
- Leaves used as anthelmintic and antipyretic, and applied externally to leprosy.
- In India and Malaya, pounded leaves are applied to skin diseases, burns and scalds.
- Poultice of leaves used for headaches.
- Infusion of flowers used for asthma.
- Olive or almond oil infusion of the fruit, without the seeds, used for chapped hands, hemorrhoids, and burns.
- Root, along with fruits and seeds, used as abortifacient, as well as remedy for urethral discharges.
- In Batavia, vine used as anthelmintic, purgative, and emetic.
- In Jamaica, leaf decoction or infusion is taken for colds, as laxative and blood cleanser. Warm tea infusions also used for toothaches and mouth infections. Also used as a bath/wash for skin eruptions and acne.
Used for eczema, malarial, gout, jaundice, abdominal pain, kidney (stone), leprosy, leucorrhea, piles, pneumonia, psoriasis, , rheumatism, fever and scabies. Also, boiled leaves and decoction of plant used to promote lochia.
- In Antilles, sweetened decoction of leaves used as emmenagogue and vermifuge.
- In Cuba, used for diabetes mellitus; used for wounds refractive to other treatments, for skin disease, and for sterility in women.
- In Puerto Rico, used for diabetes.
- In Indo-China, fruit macerated in salted water used for fluxes, catarrh, and children's coughs. Seeds employed in the treatment of dysentery.
- In Brazil, seeds used as anthelmintic.
In China, used as hypoglycemic and antidiabetic.
In Turkey, used for healing of cutaneous lesions and peptic ulcers.
Others
- Seeds with oil, employed as cosmetic.
- Leaves used to clean metals.

Akapulko (Cassia alata)

Properties
 • Saponin acts as a laxative and expels intestinal parasites.
 • Its fungicide property derives from chrysophanic acid.
• Plant considered alterative, abortifacient, aperient, purgative, sudorific, hydragogue, diuretic, vermifuge.

 Parts utilized Leaves, seeds, and flowers.

 Uses: The seeds used for intestinal parasitism.
- Tincture from leaves reported to be purgative.
 - Decoction of leaves and flowers for cough and as expectorant in bronchitis and asthma. Also used as astringent.
 - Crushed leaves and juice extract used for ringworm, scabies, eczema, tinea infections, itches, insect bites, herpes. In Africa, the boiled leaves are used for hypertension.
- In South American, used for skin diseases, stomach problems, fever, asthma, snake bites and venereal disease.
 - In Thailand, leaves are boiled and drunk to hasten delivery. - As laxative, boil 10-15 dried leaves in water, taken in the morning and bedtime.
- For wound treatment, leaves are boiled and simmered to one-third volume, then applied to affected areas twice daily.
- In India, plant used as cure for poisonous bites and for venereal eruptions. - In Nigeria locally used for treatment of ringworm and parasitic skin diseases.
 - In the Antilles, Reunion, and Indo-China, plant is used as hydrogogue, sudorific, and diuretic. - Decoction of roots used for tympanites.
 - Wood used as alterative.
 - Sap of leaves used as antiherpetic.
- Leaf tincture or extract used as purgative.
- Juice of leaves mixed with lime-juice for ringworm.
- Leaves taken internally to relieve constipation.
 - Strong decoction of leaves and flowers used as wash for eczema. - Infusion of leaves and flowers used for asthma and bronchitis.
 - Strong decoction of leaves used as abortifacient.
 - Seeds used as vermifuge.