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Aromatherapy and Essential oil Misconceptions
Jasmine absolute
Common belief: Jasmine is a galactagogue and so promotes the flow of breast milk.
In India, jasmine flowers are traditionally applied as a poultice to the breasts to suppress milk flow after a stillbirth. Since jasmine absolute is produced from the flowers, traditional use indicates a lactation-inhibiting effect. There is also some scientific support for this. A study involving sixty women, compared the efficacy of bromocriptine (a lactation inhibiting drug) with the application of jasmine flowers (Jasminum sambac) to the breasts. Both treatments produced a significant reduction in milk production. It was postulated that both tactile and olfactory stimuli of the flowers were responsible for the suppression of lactation.
Fennel, Rosemary and Sage
Essential oils such as fennel (Foeniculum vulgare) rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis) sage (Salvia officinalis) and hyssop (Hyssopus officinalis) promote epileptic seizures in prone subjects.
There is not a single reported case of anyone having suffered an epileptic seizure as a result of receiving aromatherapy massage. Nevertheless, it’s well-known that almost any powerful odor (including perfume and gasoline) has the potential to provoke epileptic seizures in certain sufferers. Consulting psychiatrist Dr Tim Betts at the Queen Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital in Birmingham England, has been researching the uses of essential oils in the treatment of epilepsy. Ylang ylang has proved to be helpful in many cases.
Overuse is Misuse
Daily applications of aromatherapy skin-care products will smooth out wrinkles and make you look a decade younger!
Contrary to the hype, long-term use of any essential oil - especially in the relatively high concentrations advocated in aromatherapy - can lead to skin sensitization.
This is more serious than mere skin irritation at the site of application, for it involves the immune system. Once the body is sensitized, the skin will react negatively to any amount of the offending essential oil whenever it comes into contact with the substance. Moreover, even inhaling the offending essential oil (sometimes a number of oils may be involved) can be enough to promote a skin reaction. Even if your immune system is perfectly comfortable with all essential oils, there is absolutely no need to apply them to the skin day after day. Essential oils are highly potent therapeutic agents and should be respected as such. In my own experience, skin responds best to periodic aromatherapy treatments - say, twice daily applications of an aromatic skin cream, oil or lotion for 7 days each month. Provided the skin is given a rest period, it will continue to respond positively to the treatment.
Sandalwood - The Sole distributor exaggeration
‘We are the sole distributors of the world’s finest ethically harvested Indian sandalwood oil’. In truth, all legal supplies of Indian sandalwood are ethically harvested. In an attempt to curb wanton deforestation, the collection and distillation of sandalwood is tightly controlled by the Indian government.
Legally imported Indian sandalwood oil (supplies are extremely limited) always carry a government seal of authenticity. IIf there is any doubt ask your supplier for a copy of the official government certificate.
Much of this oil is from immature trees, the resulting low-grade oil may then be adulterated with a level of sophistication that can be extremely difficult to detect. Moreover, sandalwood is one of the easiest aromatics to replicate in the laboratory, hence the reason why the market is flooded with synthetic counterparts.
Mythical Rosewood:
"We sell rosewood oil distilled from trees grown in government controlled plantations in South America."
Like Indian sandalwood, rosewood (Aniba rosaeodora var amazonica) is on the verge of extinction. It is a rainforest tree found mainly on the banks of the Amazon river in southern Brazil.
In an attempt to provide the indigenous people with a long-term source of income, the Brazilian government has sanctioned a replanting programme. Even if, the agencies involved do find a way to breathe life into the remaining subsoil, it will take at least 30 years before the new trees are mature enough to produce a commercially viable quantity of essential oil.
If cultivated rosewood oil is non-existent, then what are we being sold? The answer is simple: the oil derives from rosewood leaves.
Wheatgerm oil: To prolong the life of your massage blends, add up to 15 per cent of wheatgerm oil. The reasoning behind this statement is that wheatgerm oil is high in vitamin E, a natural antioxidant. So by adding it to other vegetable oils, it guards against rancidity. Now, anyone who is familiar with wheatgerm oil, both the volatile solvent-extracted type or that which is warm pressed, will know that the oil turns rancid very quickly. Therefore, it must be kept refrigerated and used up within a few months of opening the bottle.
Contradiction in quantity
The relatively small amounts of essential oil commonly used by clinical aromatherapists to treat infections cannot possibly be as effective as larger doses of antibiotic drugs. Back in the 1930s, aromatherapy pioneer Rene-Maurice Gattefosse noted that essential oils diluted to a degree at which they no longer have any effect on cultures in vitro (in a test solution outside the body), still have a clear, rapid and beneficial action in vivo (in the living body). Research carried out in 1978 by Dr Jean Valnet , as well as agreeing with the findings of Gattefosse, Valnet’s team found that essential oils do not operate in the same manner as antibiotic drugs in vivo.
As indicated above, minute concentrations of essential oils are often more potent than the relatively massive doses of antibiotics normally prescribed. Moreover, antibiotics wipe out beneficial micro-organisms along with the infection, and thus compromise the immune system; whereas essential oils stimulate the body’s immune defences. (Incidentally, it should be made clear that medical treatment with essential oils to treat infections entails taking the encapsulated oils by mouth or sometimes in the form of suppositories.)
For those who advocate standardized essential oils or insist on specific chemotypes for certain conditions, Valnet’s team conclude: The existence of several chemotypes of the same oil does not significantly impair our results. On the contrary, even if Thyme for, example, varies in its composition of thymol, carvacrol, terpineol etc, it still acts in each case in the same way, provided that the essence is completely pure. Often their mode of action cannot be explained in terms of current scientific knowlege.
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