Eden Apothecary · Herb Profile
Panax notoginseng
Also known as Tienchi, San Qi
Pronounced Notoginseng / Tienchi (San Qi): noh-toh-JIN-seng; tee-EN-chee; sahn-CHEE. Panax notoginseng: PAY-naks noh-toh-jin-SENG.
Warm and blood-moving: a sweet, slightly bitter root that stanches bleeding while dispersing blood stagnation, reduces traumatic swelling, and relieves fixed, stabbing pain.
Avoid. As a blood-invigorating herb that dispels blood stasis, notoginseng is traditionally contraindicated in pregnancy, and its documented antiplatelet activity adds a theoretical bleeding concern. Reliable human pregnancy safety data are lacking: insufficient data, avoid. Source: AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook, 2nd ed. (Gardner and McGuffin, 2013), Panax notoginseng; classical TCM pregnancy contraindication.
Avoid; insufficient data. No reliable data describe transfer of notoginseng saponins or dencichine into breast milk or effects on the nursing infant. Given the herb's antiplatelet activity and the absence of lactation data, avoid during breastfeeding. Source: AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook, 2nd ed. (2013); NCCIH (limited data).
Not established; avoid without professional supervision. Notoginseng is not a traditional pediatric remedy and no pediatric safety or dosing data support its bleeding-and-trauma use in children. Any use should be practitioner-directed. Source: AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook, 2nd ed. (2013); NCCIH (insufficient data).
A blood-moving root with a genuinely bidirectional effect on the blood: it stanches bleeding, yet its saponins also inhibit platelet aggregation and prolong bleeding time, so the central safety concern is unpredictable bleeding or clotting when it is combined with blood-affecting drugs. Use cautiously in anyone with a bleeding disorder, peptic ulcer, or recent major trauma, and discontinue about one to two weeks before surgery or dental extraction. The conditions it is reached for, hemorrhage, angina, stroke, and serious trauma, are themselves medical emergencies or red-flag diagnoses, so unsupervised self-treatment is unsafe. Intensively cultivated notoginseng root can carry pesticide and heavy-metal residues, so source tested material.
Pregnancy (stasis-dispelling blood-invigorator); active hemorrhagic disorders or hemophilia and the perioperative period (stop about one to two weeks before surgery); concurrent warfarin, other anticoagulant, antiplatelet, or thrombolytic therapy except under close medical supervision with monitoring; known hypersensitivity. Serious or unexplained bleeding, chest pain, and stroke symptoms require emergency medical diagnosis, not self-treatment.
Panax notoginseng is essentially all field-cultivated today, grown as an intensive monoculture in Yunnan and Guangxi; truly wild plants are now rare, but the commercial supply is farmed rather than wild-harvested, so scarcity is not the primary concern (it is not United Plant Savers listed, being an East Asian rather than North American plant). The real sourcing issue is quality: intensive cultivation and replant soils can leave pesticide and heavy-metal residues in the root. Source cultivated material from suppliers who provide botanical-identity and contaminant testing.
Not in canonical biblical texts and unknown to the ancient Mediterranean world. Native to the mountains of Yunnan and Guangxi in southern China and first prominently recorded in Li Shizhen's Ben Cao Gang Mu (1596), which praises it as more precious than gold. It has been a cornerstone of Chinese traumatology and hemostasis for roughly four centuries and remains the heart of Yunnan Baiyao. A distinct species from Panax ginseng and Panax quinquefolius.
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