"datsy" wrote in message
...


My main purpose for
buying the plant was its use in skin care. Having used commercial
aloe
vera
gel for many years for things like sunburn, insect bites, eczema,
etc.,
it
seemed a good idea to be able to use it fresh. Even if my plant
turns out
not to be a true aloe vera, its gel still seems to have the same
cooling
effect.

This is exactly the sort of problem that dodgy dealers selling
spurious
plants labelled "aloe vera" to members of the public can result
in. Not
all species of aloe are benign and some have seriously caustic
sap. It
is extremely inadvisable to use any plant that you cannot
positively
identify as the correct species for any kind of medical treatment.
It is
pretty hairy using one that is the right species too since you
have no
way of measuring the concentration of active ingredients - and the
dose
makes the poison.

A friend of mine has just been through radiotherapy and she
bought a
plant to help with skin care after the treatment. In the US some
radiotherapy units have aloe vera plants so that patients can use
them
immediately after treatment. This is to get the record straight
as to why
I
have an aloe vera (or whatever it is - or more to the point,
whatever
they
are, since they're multiplying so rapidly)!

You really need to determine if your plant is aloe vera or not
*URGENTLY* and certainly before you risk using it in contact with
your
skin again.

The real aloe vera used at the right concentrations is remarkably
effective as a burns treatment. But there is not much margin for
error.


Many, many thanks for this advice, Martin. It *is* worrying if
garden
centres are advising customers to treat their skin with something
that is
not beneficial and can even cause harm.

Please do not go to garden centres for medical advice. Their purpose
is only to sell you plants, garden related materials and equipment, as
well as knick-knacks. The NHS is the place to obtain medical
information.

I bought mine from a garden centre
where they had a number of these plants and they were in fact giving
the
benefits of aloe vera to a customer in front of me who was suffering
from
bad eczema.

They were not qualified to do so. Doctors and apothecaries spend
half-a-dozen years acquiring the appropriate knowledge and experience.
How much time to you think a garden centre attendant has spent
learning about such matters?

Franz

On Mon, 9 Aug 2004 19:32:46 +0000 (UTC), "Franz Heymann"
wrote:

All this messing about with raw plant material is either
pointless or dangerous.

Or .... excessively stupid! Get a grip for goodness sake - without
proper knowledge you can kill yourself by self medication. True, Aloe
vera will not see you off, but without the right doseage, it can make
you feel so ill that you wish you were dead!!!

Dave Poole
Torquay, Coastal South Devon UK
Winter min -2°C. Summer max 34°C.
Growing season: March - November

In article ,
Dave Poole wrote:
On Mon, 9 Aug 2004 19:32:46 +0000 (UTC), "Franz Heymann"
wrote:

All this messing about with raw plant material is either
pointless or dangerous.

Or .... excessively stupid! Get a grip for goodness sake - without
proper knowledge you can kill yourself by self medication. True, Aloe
vera will not see you off, but without the right doseage, it can make
you feel so ill that you wish you were dead!!!

Interesting.

Actually, some of the safest medicinal plants are the most illegal.
You will find it very hard to harm yourself by the use of raw Cannabis
sativa, Papaver somniferum and so on. But you may well get locked
up in the clink :-)

Don't, however, even think of using many of the standard medicinal
herbs naively, such as Atropa belladonna, Aconitum napellus or
Digitalis purpurea. A slight overdose and bye, bye, birdie.

Care is needed even with common culinary herbs when used in medicinal
quantities - thymol is a good antiseptic, but can cause quite a lot
of problems.



Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On 9/8/04 11:01 pm, in article , "Nick
Maclaren" wrote:

snip

Care is needed even with common culinary herbs when used in medicinal
quantities - thymol is a good antiseptic, but can cause quite a lot
of problems.


We sell Echinacea and Oenothera plants (among many other potentially
good/harmful plants) . Perhaps we should set ourselves up as herbalists and
practitioners of complementary medicine........
--
Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
(remove the weeds to email me)
..

In message , datsy
writes

have an aloe vera (or whatever it is - or more to the point, whatever
they
are, since they're multiplying so rapidly)!

You really need to determine if your plant is aloe vera or not
*URGENTLY* and certainly before you risk using it in contact with your
skin again.

The real aloe vera used at the right concentrations is remarkably
effective as a burns treatment. But there is not much margin for error.

Many, many thanks for this advice, Martin. It *is* worrying if garden
centres are advising customers to treat their skin with something that is
not beneficial and can even cause harm. I bought mine from a garden centre
where they had a number of these plants and they were in fact giving the
benefits of aloe vera to a customer in front of me who was suffering from
bad eczema.

It might or might not be the right plant. It is impossible to say from
your description. It is very odd that a garden centre should be giving
out medical advice though...

The thing is an untidy quick grower and mainly noted in the UK as being
good for amateur cacti and succulent society plant sales because of
public demand for it. A sport with slightly tidier growth is always
possible. If you can flower it then the flowers of aloe vera are yellow
which cuts out a lot of the orange and red flowered look alikes.

There is good reason to be wary of using randomly chosen aloes. They
belong to the lily family and some people are sensitive to other
chemicals in their sap. Allergies tend to show up on the second
exposure.

Here are a few links to images of the real Aloe vera:

http://plantsdatabase.com/showimage/15930.html
http://www.hear.org/starr/hiplants/i...ml/starr_03052
3_0060_aloe_vera.htm

At our latitude they tend to be leggy and leaves more translucent.

I suspect that it will not be particularly good for pharmaceutical use
grown at our latitude and/or under glass. Most plants generate their
really interesting chemicals in response to the stress of strong UV in
sunlight at lower latitudes.

Regards,
--
Martin Brown

It might or might not be the right plant. It is impossible to say from
your description. It is very odd that a garden centre should be giving
out medical advice though...

The thing is an untidy quick grower and mainly noted in the UK as being
good for amateur cacti and succulent society plant sales because of
public demand for it. A sport with slightly tidier growth is always
possible. If you can flower it then the flowers of aloe vera are yellow
which cuts out a lot of the orange and red flowered look alikes.

There is good reason to be wary of using randomly chosen aloes. They
belong to the lily family and some people are sensitive to other
chemicals in their sap. Allergies tend to show up on the second
exposure.

Here are a few links to images of the real Aloe vera:

http://plantsdatabase.com/showimage/15930.html
http://www.hear.org/starr/hiplants/i...ml/starr_03052
3_0060_aloe_vera.htm

At our latitude they tend to be leggy and leaves more translucent.


There are a few pictures in the plants database that do look exactly like
mine, particularly one which was apparantly grown without direct sunlight -
just like mine! Doubt if it will flower unless it does get some sun ;-( ! It
"is" confusing though, because even these pictures show remarkably different
aloes - the ones growing in clusters which are usually shown on aloe vera
products, and ones like mine which grown vertically on a stem!