Allspice

Flatulent colicky pain with cold, sluggish digestion, worse after eating

Overview. Allspice is the dried unripe berry of an evergreen tree native to the West Indies, southern Mexico, and Central America, so named because its flavor was thought to combine clove, cinnamon, and nutmeg in one spice. The fruit and its essential oil have long served as both a kitchen spice and a folk medicine, and it appears in the physiomedicalist materia medica as a diffusive aromatic stimulant used to warm and settle the digestive tract. Modern use retains this same simple, practical role: a fragrant carminative that calms griping, nausea, and flatulent colic, and that makes bitter or purgative preparations more tolerable.

Clinical Notes. Allspice earns its place as a corrective rather than a primary remedy. Reach for it when a formula containing bitters, senna, or other harsh cathartics needs softening: a small addition of allspice berry reduces griping and nausea without blunting the main action, much as ginger or fennel are used for the same purpose.

Action and Therapy. A pungent, aromatic stimulant and carminative, but used chiefly as a flavoring agent. The oil, in doses of two to five drops, is sometimes given in flatulence and other conditions in which essential oils are usually displayed.

Properties and Uses. This berry is much used as a condiment, and is one of the lightest and pleasantest of the spices. It is diffusively stimulating, leaving behind a mild astringent impression, and usually proving very acceptable to the stomach often allaying vomiting.