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Flowers, exclusively, have found uses as medicine and cosmetics in all systems of medicine. Sharma (1998) recorded the use of flowers in Ayurveda.
Edward Bach, a Welsh homoeopathic physician, discovered around 1920, the therapeutic benefits of water into which flowers of selected plants have been dipped in sunlight for a few hours. He used this therapy for about 17 years. It was noticed that the therapy worked better in the young and in case of recent disturbances (Chancellor, 1971).
Bach’s therapy is a modification of Aromatherapy, with the exclusive use of flowers. It is believed that flower essences define moods and emotions. Personality disturbances, loneliness, fear, indecision, despondence, despair, over care, over sensitivity, insufficient interest in self and others, etc., are among the 38 states of the disturbed mind identified by Bach for which he prescribed flowers of 38 different species.
Flower remedies are prepared in two ways (Jamil, 1997):
a) Sun method: steeping petals in water and exposing them to sunlight for three hours, and
b) Heat method: boiling flowers for 30 min.
In each case, brandy is added to the water filtered after extraction, to make the mother tincture, which is heavily diluted in grape alcohol (Jamil, 1997). Flower remedies are considered very safe, even when a wrong prescription was used!! (Forbes, 1983).
The 38 floral prescriptions of Bach use 38 different European species. Consequently, Bach’s remedies had limited application outside Europe, where the flowers or the prepared medicine has to be imported. However, the following species occur in the temperate Himalayan regions of India: agrimony (Agrimonia eupatoria), beech (Fagus sylvatica), cherry plum (Prunus cerasifera), chestnut (Castanea sativa), chicory (Cichorium intybus), gentian (Gentiana lutea), gorse (Ulex europaeus, occurs at Ooty), holly (Ilex aquifolium), honey suckle (Lonicera periclymenum), impatiens (Impatiens balsamina, cultivated throughout India), larch (Larix europaea), mustard (Brassica nigra, Brassica juncea, cultivated throughout India), oak (Quercus species), olive (Olea europaea), vervain (Verbena officinalis), vine (Vitis vinifera), walnut (Juglans regia), wild oats (Avena fastua), and willow (Salix viminalis, Salix capraea).
Two variants of Bach’s remedies, Vitaflorum and Exaltation of Flowers, developed by others, use flowers of several species simultaneously. Combination remedies, with five or so chosen flowers, such as the flowers of cherry, plum, impatiens, rock rose, clematis, star of Bethlehem, called Rescue remedies, are also used.
The recent report on antibacterial activity, against Escherichia coli CA 8000, in the floral petals of 20 species of angiosperms in India, in comparison with streptomycin, (Darokar et al., 1998), adds a new dimension to flower remedies. Whether Bach’s chosen flowers also have antibacterial activity, has not been considered.
REFERENCES
Chancellor, P.M. 1971.
Handbook on the Bach flower remedies. Saffron Waldon, Essex.Darokar, M.P., Mathur, A., Dwivedi, S., Bhalla, P., Khanuja, S.P.S. and Mumar, S. 1998. Detection of antibacterial activity in the flower petals of some higher plants. Curr. Sci., 75: 187-189.
Forbes, H.A.W. 1983. Selected individual therapies. In Traditional medicine and health care coverage. (eds.) Bannerman, R.H., Burton, J. and Wen-Chieh, C. World Health Organisation, Geneva. pp 163-171.
Jamil, T. 1997. Alternative medicine. Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.
Sharma, P.V. 1998. Pushpayurveda. Chaukamba, Varanasi.
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