Sassafras Station

Ivy is an evergreen climbing plant that has been used for many years to treat asthma, help treat coughs and even used in creams to lighten stretch marks.

In many parts of the world it’s used as an expectorant (it thins the mucous and loosens coughs). It also thins the mucous in the respiratory passages which makes it a good remedy for asthma, acute bronchitis, chronic bronchitis and colds.

Even though people have been using ivy leaf for many years to treat asthma there hasn’t been much testing of ivy leaf on humans. The few tests that have been done show that ivy leaf does improve asthma symptoms.

One double blind, placebo-controlled study evaluated 24 children for three days. Some were given a placebo and some were given ivy leaf extract twice day for the three day duration of the study. The children that were given the ivy leaf extract showed improvement in their asthma symptoms.

Extensive monitoring shows that ivy leaf rarely causes any side effects. The only documented side effects were nausea and vomiting with excessive does of ivy leaf. It is not recommended to use during pregnancy because it contains a substance called emetine which has shown to increase contractions.

The dosage for children is 25 drops of ivy leaf extract in water twice a day. The adult dose is 50 drops twice a day.

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