Spearmint

Spearmint is the best known variety of mints that actually has plenty of varieties. Spearmint is used for digestive disorders including gas, indigestion, nausea, diarrhea, upper gastrointestinal tract spasms, irritable bowel syndrome (ibs), bile duct and gallbladder swelling (inflammation), and gallstones. It is also used for sore throat, colds, headaches, toothaches, cramps, cancer and inflammation of respiratory tract. Some people use it as a stimulant, germ-killer, local pain-killer, and anti-spasm medication.

Spear mint has several round stalks, and long narrowish leaves set thereon, of a dark green colour. The flowers stand in spiked heads at the tops of the branches, being of a pale blue colour. The plant has a fragrant smell, and a pleasant aromatic taste. It is cultivated in gardens. Its roots are abundant.

It is valuable for its carminative and aromatic properties which reside in its volatile oil, of a pungent and peculiar odour. Says it has a heating, binding and drying quality, and therefore the juice taken in vinegar, stays bleeding. It dissolves being applied with barley-meal. The application of the juice mixed with honey relieves pains in the ears, and roughness of the tongue. Applied to the forehead and temples, it relieves pains in the head, and the heads of children, against breakings-out, sores or scabs.

The whole plant is used fresh or dried, and is excellent for flatulency, sickness, vomiting and weakness of the stomach. It generally stops vomiting and creates an appetite. Some apply the fresh herb bruised to the stomach for the removal of its comaplaints. Bruised and mixed with salt it is said to cure the bite of a mad dog. Given as an infusion it has relived diarrhoea.

Spearmint is pleasantly aromatic herb packed with numerous health benefiting vitamins, antioxidants and phyto-nutrients.

The leaves and herb parts contain essential oil, menthol.

Unlike in peppermint, spearmint leaves composes only small amounts of menthol, 0.5% compared to the 40% in peppermint.

Less menthol content would make this herb least pungent and subtly fragrant herb in the mint family.

The herb has low calories (about 43 calories per 100 g) and contains zero cholesterol.

The chief essential oil in spearmint is menthol.

Other important chemical components of spearmint are a-pinene, a-pinene, carvone, cineole, linalool, limonene, myrcene and caryophyllene. These compounds in mint help relieve fatigue and stress.

The herb parts are also very good in minerals like potassium, calcium, manganese, iron (148% of rda), and magnesium.

Iron is required for enzymes in cellular metabolism and synthesis of hemoglobin.

Potassium is an important component of cell and body fluids that helps control heart rate and blood pressure.

Manganese is used by the body as a co-factor for the antioxidant enzyme superoxide dismutase.

Further, the herb is also rich in many antioxidant vitamins, including vitamin a (provides 4054 iu or 135% of rda), beta-carotene, vitamin c, folates (26% of rda), vitamin b-6 (pyridoxine), riboflavin and thiamin.

Spearmint also gives relief to your digestive system and eliminates gas from the system.

It also strengthens our stomach and is a very useful to deal with nausea, flatulence and hiccups as it relaxes the stomach muscles.

According to a review of the potential health benefits of spearmint tea, published in the journal phytotherapy research, "human studies on the gi, respiratory tract and analgesic effects of peppermint oil and its constituents have been reported". However, more research is necessary to back this claim.

The essential oil coming from the spearmint leaves work as an anti-infective and antiseptic.

However, it can be toxic if the dose becomes excess.

The stem and the essential oil, extracted from the spearmint tree are used to prepare remedies for cancer.

Spearmint oil can help in the problems of the respiratory, glandular and nervous systems.

It also acts as carminative (substance that removes gas and aids the digestive system) , anti-inflammatory and anti-parasitic.

Spearmint is found to work as a hormone and this activity often releases the emotional blocks.

The essential oil, menthol, has analgesic, local anaesthetic and counterirritant properties.

Menthol also found application in the preparation of toothpaste and mouth refreshers.

On the skin, when used as cream or lotion, it may help relieve the itching of pruritis, dermatitis, and hives.

Spearmint oil is used as blended massage oil and in the aromatic therapy to help relieve headaches, stress, fatigue, and nervous conditions and to relieve itching.

Spearmint tea can be used safely in pregnancy.

In women, it helps reduce unwanted hairs through its anti-androgenic properties.

The decoction gargled in the mouth, cures sore gums and mouth. I have frequently cured young ladies of relaxed and consumptive habits by ordering them to go with the maid a milking for a few mornings, and take with them a new laid egg beaten up with a table-spoonful of rum, and a little spear-mint cut small, to which add a tea-cup full of new milk from the cow. This drank in the field, and the morning air have done wonders.

A report, published in the journal of chemistry, revealed that spearmint extract has "good total phenolic and flavonoid contents.

It exhibited excellent antioxidant activity1, as measured by a-carotene bleaching and 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (dpph) assays"

Spearmint essential oil is associated with a number of antifungal properities2, according to a study presented at the 2011 international conference on environmental and agriculture engineering.

Relieving symptoms of digestive problems - spearmint may help relax the stomach muscles, reducing symptoms of nausea and other digestive problems.

Treating hirutism (abnormal hair growth) - there is very promising data published in the journal phytotherapy research showing that drinking two cups of spearmint tea a day for five days could reduce the level of androgens in women with hirsutism.

Women with hirsutism grow hair on their face, breasts, and stomach.

This can cause a great deal of distress.

The hair grows because of excessively high levels of the 'masculinizing' androgen hormones.