Greetings!
In herbal medicine there are many archaic medical terms that are still frequently used. Many of these terms were once common in mainstream medicine but are now mostly forgotten. One of the problems with older terminology is that in many cases the words are not very well defined. This can and does lead to a great deal of confusion and misunder-standing amongst herbalists and people reading books on herbal medicine. Today I would like to talk about one of these old concepts/words, the class of medicines known as alteratives. Alterative comes from the Latin word altero, meaning to change.
Substances that were originally credited with this activity were primarily medicines used to cleanse tainted blood. Prior to the germ theory, the idea that people could be born with or acquire what were known as miasms was common. These foul humors soured the blood and created illness. Thus, alteratives were believed to clean the blood (in practice they where primarily antisyphylitics), restore the balance within the humors and help return the patient to health.
To further compound the confusion there are several other terms that
are also used to describe substances with similar activities. These
include antidyscratic (an alterative that primarily works on the fluid
metabolism, i.e., the kidneys) and depurative which has an identical
meaning to alterative.
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My definition of an alterative, which I believe to be an accurate description of what these herbs actually do, is: An alterative is a substance that gently increases elimination of metabolic wastes through the major eliminatory organs (lungs, lymph, skin, kidney, liver, and bowel) thus improving the body's abilities to heal and function in a healthy manner. Antidyscratic agents are alteratives that have a greater effect on the kidneys and especially enhance elimination of uric acid, purines and other water soluble wastes (i.e., Juniper berry, Pipsissewa, Cleavers, Nettle Leaf, etc.).
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Usually I use a combination of mild alteratives, one moderate alterative and very small amounts of the stronger acting alteratives (limit doses to amounts that do not cause catharsis, vomiting, or nausea). Which alteratives are chosen depends on the specific condition being treated and the energetics of the person.
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