Early spring is the best time to get to know and collect medicinal plants. That's why on 19 May we invited people to a lecture-discussion on "Herbal Medicine in Traditional Chinese Medicine and in Lithuania", where two expert herbalists presented the medicinal plants growing in May from their own perspectives. The lecture gave the audience the opportunity not only to hear, but also to learn how to correctly identify, collect and prepare herbs for use. The main focus was on the May herbs – dandelion (Taraxacum officinale), nettle (Urtica dioica) and ground elder (Aegopodium podagraria).
The lecture was given by two representatives of the field: Dr Vitalijus Naumavičius, physiotherapist, rehabilitation therapist, doctor of biomedical sciences, member of the board of the World Federation of Chinese Medicine (WFCMS) and representative for Europe, VU lecturer, and Marius Lasinskas, herbalist, doctoral student at Vytautas Magnus University Agriculture Academy , vice-president of the "Herbal Medicine Academy", lecturer.
What can be common between different ecosystems, do we have similar medicinal plants, when and how to use them? These questions and more were hopefully answered by the participants of the event. After all, people in all parts of the world use medicinal plants for treatment and prevention. However, their diversity depends on geographical location. The use of medicinal plants for health and healing is influenced by the following factors: the ecological situation of the country, the ethnomedical traditions of the particular country, the qualifications of the professionals working in the field of phytotherapy, and the availability of comprehensive data on medicinal plants.
According to Dr. Vitalius Naumavičius, medicinal plants - tradition - technology are interacting parts that complement each other. The scientist defined the concept of a medicinal plant and tried to prove that medicinal plants do not exist in nature. They become such when we interact with them and use them for healing. The concept of a medicinal plant is covered by knowledge from different disciplines such as ecology, botany, pharmacy and medicine.
It was interesting to hear that in Lithuania, the 458 species of plants that grow spontaneously are medicinal, and of these, as many as 198 are used in traditional Chinese medicine. The catalogued system of medicinal plants in our country has only been in place for less than 200 years. Meanwhile, acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine began to be used in China at least 2200 years ago, although the earliest known written source on Chinese medicine is the Huangdi Neijing from the 3rd century BC. This work presented the theoretical concepts of TCM that underpin TCM today.
Dr Vitalijus Naumavičius concluded the theoretical part of the lecture with a reminder of why such a small territory as Lithuania has such a large plant diversity. The answer is very simple - because Lithuania has 5 ecological niches: the northern spruce forest zone, the broad-leaved forest zone, the coastal zone, the steppe zone and the continental sands, not including water bodies, land and coasts.
In the second practical part of the event, herbalist Marius Lasinskas introduced Lithuanian spring herbs - dandelion, nettle and ground elder. Demonstrating dandelion, herbalist Marius said: "if a plant looks like a human, it will be useful from the tips of your toes to your head". And indeed, it turns out that the dandelion is useful from the roots to the blossom.
Mr Lasinskas gave a series of recipes for herbal mixtures and spices, and advised on which herbal mixtures or infusions to use at which times to get the best effect from them.
As a representative of traditional Chinese medicine in Lithuania, Dr Vitalijus Naumavičius agreed with Marius Lasinskas and pointed out that the differences in the use of medicinal plants may be due to the Chinese medical term - thermoregulatory activity (heating-cooling, hot-cold, neutral). For example, nettle is warm, hot, while dandelion is cooling, cool.
Thus, we can conclude that knowing the Chinese and our local uses of the plants allows us to differentiate more precisely and target our use more precisely, e.g. in addition to its thermoregulatory properties, nettle and dandelion are both detoxifying, improving the liver function. Birch leaf, nettle and dandelion, on the other hand, promote the elimination of stagnant phenomena from the body.
At the end of the lecture, the participants could ask the scientists questions and buy two books published by M. Lasinskas: "Children in the World of Herbs" (2019) and "Herbal Tales. And Health Recipes for the Whole Family (2022).
So, after the lecture, we asked what is better, dandelion or ginseng? The scientific consensus was that it doesn't matter which herb, it's important that the person uses the one that suits him or her and achieves the desired result. It is useful to gather and accumulate knowledge based on one's own cultural experience, to share it wisely, and sometimes it is useful to draw on other traditions that have preserved it more.