Ochroleucous gentian

Weak, slow digestion with poor appetite in a convalescent patient, pale tongue and low vitality

Bitter taste on the tongue used deliberately, a few minutes before meals, to prime salivary and gastric secretion in someone who eats without appetite

Overview. Gentiana ochroleuca is an old name applied by nineteenth century American botanical writers to a native gentian of the southeastern United States, bearing greenish-white to straw-colored flowers and a stout, branched root. It is now generally regarded as the same plant known botanically as Gentiana villosa, one of several native American gentians (including the closed and striped gentians) that Eclectic and physiomedical practitioners used interchangeably with the European Gentiana lutea as a bitter tonic root. The dried root was the part employed, given before meals to rouse a flagging appetite and support digestion in the weak or convalescent.

Clinical Notes. This American gentian was used by nineteenth century practitioners much as European gentian root is used today: as a simple bitter, taken shortly before meals to stimulate salivary and gastric secretion in patients whose appetite and digestion have become sluggish, particularly after acute illness or in states of general debility.

Properties and Uses. This root is a tonic of about equally relaxing and stimulating properties; slow in its action, but intense and permanent. Most writers (especially Dr. J. King, of the Eclectic Dispensatory) class it as an astringent; but it possesses no astringent property whatever, and is, on the contrary, a mild laxative.

Action, Medical Uses, and Dosage. Gentiana quinqueflora, Five-flowered gentian, sometimes called Gall-weed, on account of its intense bitterness, has been found of much service in headache, liver affections, jaundice, etc., and is greatly superior in its action to the official root. This is certainly a valuable tonic and cholagogue, and deserves further investigation. It is regarded a valuable agent in chronic gastro-intestinal atony. Dose of a saturated tincture of the recent root, from 5 to 40 drops.