Welcome to the forum, Kenzie.
Correct me if I am wrong, but the plant that seems to be all the rage on the internet lately, particularly in your part of the world, and mentioned in your blog as "
Sabah snake grass", has been known for some time as
Clinacanthus nutans. In Thailand it is a well known anti-snake venom remedy and the local name seems to be "Saled pangpon tua mea (Saliva of the female mongoose)"
This plant has interesting properties but has not been extensively studied scientifically. The are a lot of claims out there for its medicinal use but I think we should withhold judgement until there are more data. Some recent data suggest Clinacanthus nutans has potent
anti-inflammatory effects.http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Clinacanthus&itool=QuerySuggestionTraditional Use:
Clinacanthus nutans is a well known anti-snake venom amongst the traditional healers of Thailand. The mechanism of action of
this plant is bel ieved to be attributed to its anti-cell lysis property rather than as an anti-neuromuscular transmission blocker.
They also use the plant to treat scorpion bi tes and nettle rash.
In China the whole plant is used in various manner to treat inflammatory conditions l ike haematoma, contusion, strains and sprains of injuries and rheumatism.[1][2][3] Gastrointestinal Diseases Indonesian and Thai tradi tional healers make use of Clinacanthus nutans to treat dysentery. The Indonesians take a handful of the the fresh leaves, boiled them in 5 glasses of water until the water level recedes to about 3 glasses and the decoction is givenin a dose of 1 glass each time. [4]
Other uses
In Indonesia the plant is used to treat diabetes by boiling 7 – 21 fresh leaves in 2 glasses of water unti l the water level recedes to
1 glass and this is given twice daily. Dysuria is treated by taking 15 g
of fresh leaves and boi l ing them for 15 minutes. The decoction is consumed once daily.[4]
Hello MooseMom. No, I am not a dialysis patient and I dont have any family members or loved ones with kidney failure. But I do understand the hardship and pains of one undergoing dialysis on alternate days. It must be very difficult to deal with such a lifetime thrice-weekly dialysis sessions. I just signup in this site yesterday and I hope I can help by cheering dialysis patients with my personal blog. I am still studying whether I can put my site address here or not as I understand some websites wont allow that. As I am still very new here, I need to learn how to navigate around this site. You are the 1st one to write to me MooseMom, thanks and best regards
Kenzie