Li Shizhen's "Compendium of Materia Medica" records: Epimedium is a good medicine for nourishing male sexual function. Drinking cinnamon, wolfberry, and soaked wine is effective for male sexual function.

Why is it called epimedium? The reason is that in northern Sichuan, there are many shepherds among the villagers. After the sheep eat this grass, they can mate hundreds of times a day without any danger, so they are called immoral sheep. The reason why the immoral sheep are immoral sheep is that they often eat local grasses such as bean leaves (the bean leaves are called epimedium), hence the name.

Effects of Epimedium

Epimedium is a perennial herb cultivated in Shaanxi, Gansu, Shanxi, Henan, Qinghai, Hubei, Sichuan and other regions of China. The whole plant is used as medicine, which has the effects of nourishing kidney yang, strengthening muscles and bones, and dispelling rheumatism. It can be used to treat impotence, spermatorrhea, muscle weakness, rheumatic joint pain, numbness and contracture, and menopausal hypertension.

1. Tonify the kidneys and strengthen yang

Epimedium is pungent and warm, good at tonifying the kidneys and strengthening yang, and is suitable for people with cold constitutions. It has obvious effects on symptoms such as cold limbs, chills, spontaneous sweating, soreness and weakness in the waist and knees, and frequent urination that are common among middle-aged and elderly people. In addition, epimedium can also replenish kidney yang and improve impotence, spermatorrhea, frequent urination, weakness of lower limbs, cold pain in waist and knees, etc. Can be used in conjunction with Eucommia ulmoides. Morinda officinalis and Tzu Chi roots.

2. Treatment of wind-cold-dampness syndrome

Epimedium is pungent and warm, and also helps to dispel cold and warm menstruation. It has a certain therapeutic effect on joint pain or cold pain, difficulty in joint movement, numbness of limbs, and limb contracture caused by wind-cold-dampness paralysis. It can be used in combination with Astragalus, Angelicae Sinensis, Qianghuo and Genchi.

3. Strengthen your bones and muscles

On the basis of unblocking meridians, epimedium can effectively strengthen muscles and bones and improve the discomfort of various rheumatism diseases. Therefore, epimedium is also commonly used to treat joint pain, waist and knee pain, rheumatoid arthritis or rheumatoid arthritis, osteoporosis and other diseases.

4. Reduce blood pressure

Contains icariin, which has a certain blood pressure lowering effect. It can inhibit and block the baroreflex caused by bilateral common carotid arteries, thereby inhibiting sympathetic nerves. Transient membrane contractile response induced by preganglionic fibers. It is suitable for menopausal hypertension caused by kidney yang deficiency. It can be used together with curculigo, morinda, Phellodendron, anemarrhena and other products to strengthen yang and nourish yin.

5. Enhance sexual desire

Epimedium can increase the levels of adrenaline, norepinephrine, blood ammonia, dopamine and other hormones in the body, while also reducing the levels of cortisol. Promote the secretion of testosterone, thereby enhancing sexual desire.

Nutritional value

The main components of epimedium are flavonoids, lignans, alkaloids, icariin and polysaccharides, in addition to volatile oil and chlorogenic acid , palmitic acid, stearic acid, oleic acid, linolenic acid, etc.

1. Epimedium mainly contains icariin. Epimedium extract has androgenic effects, can promote semen secretion, lower blood sugar, improve pituitary-adrenocortical system function, and promote antibody formation.

2. Epimedium flavonoids can inhibit cell activity and promote immune function; Epimedium flavonoids can protect gonads, inhibit bone resorption, and promote bone formation, making the body's bone metabolism at a level greater than bone formation. A positive balance state of bone resorption, thereby promoting bone growth, preventing calcium loss, and preventing osteoporosis.

3. Epimedium polysaccharide can promote the body's immune function, increase the number of white blood cells and lymphocytes, and improve the humoral immune function of chickens.

Function of Epimedium

1. Effect on endocrine

Epimedium can promote sexual function. It is caused by excessive secretion of semen after the seminal vesicles are full, stimulating Sensory nerves indirectly produce sexual desire. Epimedium, the main component of Epimedium, can significantly promote the development of epididymis and seminal vesicles in young mice. Epimedium has androgenic effects.

2. Impact on immune system function.

In patients with kidney deficiency, the number of T cells, lymphatic transformation rate, antibodies, antigens and phagocytic function of the reticuloendothelial system are low, which can be improved after treatment with epimedium and other kidney-tonifying drugs.

3. Impact

Comparing the effects of epimedium decoction, polysaccharides and total flavonoids on platelet aggregation, it was found that after oral administration of epimedium decoction, the hematocrit of healthy people decreased. The specific viscosity of whole blood is significantly reduced, the electrophoresis time of red blood cells is shortened, and the erythrocyte sedimentation rate is accelerated, so that the specific viscosity of whole blood is significantly reduced.

5. Effect on metabolism

Epimedium can promote DNA synthesis.

6. Anti-osteoporosis effect

Experiments have shown that Epimedium can promote DNA synthesis in bone marrow cells, indicating that Epimedium has a good effect in preventing and treating osteoporosis.