Turpentine

Deep, aching muscular pain that eases with heat, friction, and counterirritant liniments

Chronic productive cough or bronchial congestion where a warming chest rub or inhaled vapor loosens mucus and eases breathing

Overview. Oil of turpentine is the volatile oil obtained by steam distillation of the oleoresin ('crude turpentine') tapped from Pinus palustris and related pines of the southeastern United States, with the resinous residue known as colophony or rosin. In nineteenth century eclectic and regular medicine it was used both internally, for worms, urinary complaints, and hemorrhage, and externally as a rubefacient liniment and vapor for chest complaints. Its internal use has since been abandoned because of a narrow margin of safety, and it survives in modern practice almost entirely as a topical and inhaled agent.

Clinical Notes. Turpentine oil's place in modern herbal and physical medicine is external. Diluted in a carrier oil it makes a classic rubefacient liniment for deep muscular aches, stiff joints, and chronic low back pain, working by generating local heat and increased blood flow at the skin that draws attention (and, by reflex, some relief) away from deeper tissue.

Action and Therapy. External. Oil of turpentine may be used for most of the purposes named under Rectified Oil of Turpentine. However, the latter is the least likely to cause unpleasant effects. Internal. This preparation should not be used internally; only when rectified is it fit for internal medication. (See Oleum Terebinthinae Recificatum.)

Therapy. External. Turpentine is rubefacient and counter-irritant and to some degree antiseptic and hemostatic. Locally applied it is valuable to assist in relieving deep-seated and other inflammations, as in pleurisy, pneumonia, bronchitis, laryngitis, pharyngitis, peritonitis, arthritis, and other congestive and inflammatory disorders; and to alleviate pain in sciatica, myalgia, pleurodynia, and various neuralgias.