The efficacy and function of Pianxu

Polygonum multiflorum is a common food in our daily life. Because it looks a bit like mint, many people think that polygonum multiflorum and mint are the same thing. Polygonum multiflorum is usually picked around the season of Great Heat. Its leaves are picked, dried after being exposed to the sun, and can be used as tea or as traditional Chinese medicine. So what are the effects and functions of Polygonum multiflorum?

The efficacy and role of Pianxu

It can be used as a diuretic, a stranguria reliever, an insecticidal and an antipruritic agent; it is used for bladder heat stranguria, short and dark urine, painful and astringent urine, skin eczema, vaginal itching and leucorrhea, nephritis, jaundice and other symptoms.

Main Indications

Modern research shows that Radix Codonopsis has a strong diuretic effect, and its active ingredient may be the potassium salt it contains; its extract, decoction or ethanol extract has a hypotensive effect on experimental animals; it has a certain antibacterial effect on Shigella dysenteriae and an inhibitory effect on fungi; this product also has a mild astringent effect and can be used as a trauma medicine.

Morphological characteristics

Annual herb, 15 to 50 cm tall. The stem is creeping or obliquely upward, with many branches at the base, with obvious nodes and longitudinal grooves; the young branches are slightly angular. Leaves are alternate; petioles are short, about 2-3 mm, and some are nearly sessile; leaf blades are lanceolate to elliptic, 5-16 mm long, 1.5-5 mm wide, obtuse or pointed at apex, cuneate at base, entire, green, glabrous on both sides; the sheath is membranous, clasping the stem, green at the bottom, transparent and colorless at the top, with obvious veins, and the majority of parallel veins on it often extend into filamentous lobes. 6 to 10 flowers are clustered in leaf axils; pedicels are short; bracts and bracteoles are white and transparent; perianth is green, 5-parted, with white edges, which turn pink after fruiting; stamens are usually 8, with short filaments; ovary is rectangular, with short style and 3 stigmas. Achenes are surrounded by persistent perianth, with only a small part of the top exposed, ovate, with 3 edges, 2 to 3 mm long,

Dark brown with fine lines and small spots. Flowering period is from June to August. The fruiting period is from September to October.

[Habitat distribution] It grows on fields, roadsides, wastelands and river banks. Distributed all over the country. It is produced in most parts of the country, with larger outputs in Henan, Sichuan, Zhejiang, Shandong, Jilin, Hebei and other places.

[Properties] The whole plant is dried, with a cylindrical and slightly flattened stem, mostly curved, about 1.5 to 3 mm in diameter, brown-red or gray-green in surface, smooth and hairless, with vertical straight texture, enlarged nodes, and remaining red-brown or white filmy and transparent sheaths, and internodes of varying lengths; the stem near the base is hard, while the one at the top is softer, with a yellow-white broken surface and a large pith in the center, which is sometimes hollow. Leaves are green-brown or gray-green and usually fall off. The flowers are borne in the leaf axils and are red, but most have withered and disappeared; the perianth is yellow-green with pink edges at the top, and contains one achene, which is triangular-ovate. The smell is faint and the taste is cool. The best ones are green in color, have many leaves, are tender in texture and free of impurities.