Prunella: Healing with Self-Heal

 

Self-heal, botanically known as Prunella vulgaris (Family- Lamiaceae), is a relative unknown but a medicinal herb occurring in high altitude (1500-3600 m) meadows and open grassy slopes in the Himalayas, sub-temperate and temperate Asia and Europe. It is widely used in traditional Western and Chinese herbal medicine for curing many diseases and thus gets its common name, self-heal or heal all.

Common Names

English: Self-heal, Common selfheal, Heal-all, Common heal-all, Carpenter weed, Heart-of-the-earth, Aleutian selfheal, Touch and heal (indicating its value as first aid for cuts and wounds) Pahari: Gudli (Bharmour), Neela ghungru ghas (Mandi, Kullu), Ustakhadus (Spiti) Kashmiri: Kalyuth

 

MORPHOLOGY

Self-heal is a small, creeping, non-aromatic and perennial herb that grows up to 30 cm tall. The stem is quadrangular and covered with fine hair. The leaves are arranged in opposite pairs and each pair is at right angles to the pairs above and below them. The leaves are oval to lanceolate, serrated, covered with fine hair and measure  2.5 cm long and 1.5 cm wide. The inflorescence is dense and whirled cluster with a pair of stalkless leaves below. It flowers during the summers and rainy season. There are usually three flowers per bract. The bracts and calyx are purplish in colour. The corolla is violet or pink in colour,  bi-lipped and is 10–14 cm long. The upper lip forms a concave purple hood. The lower lip is lightly coloured and has three lobes. Seeds are smooth, shiny and brown nutlets. 

CHEMICAL CONSTITUENTS

Self-heal contains triterpenoids (oleanane, ursane, lupane), flavonoid (quercetin, hesperidin, kaempferol, luteolin, homoorientin, cynaroside), phenylpropanoids (phenylpropionic acids and coumarins), sterols (sitosterol and stigmasterol), coumarins, carbohydrates, organic acids (linoleic acid, linolenic acid and arachidic acid), quinones (tanshinone I, rhein, chrysophanic acid, 2-hydroxyl-3-methyanraquinone) and volatile oils (monoterpenes, sesquiterpenes and their oxygenated derivatives). 

EDIBLE USES

Leaves are used in soups and fresh or dried inflorescence is brewed in herbal teas in western countries.

MEDICINAL USES

1. Useful in Migraine

Self-heal is used to cure migraines in the Kashmir Himalayas.

 2.  Anti-Inflammatory Activity

Self-heal has been reported to fight inflammation in the human body. Experimental studies with self-heal on human heart muscle cells have shown it suppresses the activity of inflammatory proteins responsible for heart diseases and stroke. It can also protect human beings against inflammatory diseases like colitis, diarrhoea, stomach pain and rectal bleeding.

 3. Antibacterial Activity

Various experiments have shown that self-heal has remarkable antibacterial activity against gram-positive bacteria, especially against Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus and Salmonella typhi.

 4. Antiviral Activity

Some studies have shown that self-heal has antiviral activity against HIV, Ebola virus and SARS-coronavirus 2 (SCoV-2).

 5. Anti-Tumour Properties

A large number of recent scientific studies have shown that self-heal has anti-tumour properties. The triterpenoids, flavonoids and phenylpropanoids present in this plant have synergistic therapeutic effect against many types of cancers mediated through multiple pathways including arresting of cell cycle, anti-proliferation, apoptosis and anti-angiogenesis.

 6. Useful in Autoimmune Thyroiditis

Self-heal is used for treating thyroid diseases, especially autoimmune thyroiditis in traditional Chinese medicine. Scientific studies have also yielded similar results in experimental animals. 

7. Useful in Flu and Fever

Traditional healers in western countries use the leaves and flower spikes for curing flu and fever. 

8. Wound Healing

Self-heal has a long history of use in traditional European medicine for healing wounds, cuts and bruises.