Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
Haemorrhage plant (Aspilia africana) is a yellow-flowered weed found across West and Central Africa. In Igbo it is called Oro. Healers crushed the fresh leaves and pressed the juice onto cuts to slow bleeding.
It is a member of the daisy family, like marigold and ragweed. It grows fast on farm edges and waste ground. The leaves are the part used; young shoots are also eaten as a pot herb in some areas.
Here is the honest verdict on the evidence. Almost all testing has been done in test tubes and in rats. Proper human trials are missing, so the traditional claims stay unproven.
Long use in a tradition is not proof that something works. It is also not proof that it is safe. Both of those apply here, and they are not repeated later on this page.
No one has shown in people how, or whether, this plant works. The ideas below come from lab and animal work only.
In test tubes, leaf extracts have made blood clot faster and have made small blood vessels narrow. Tannins in the leaf also make raw tissue tighten and weep less. Whether that helps a real wound on a person is not established.
In rats, leaf extracts sped up the closing of skin wounds and reduced stomach sores caused by drugs or alcohol. Rats are not people, and wound care in a lab is clean and controlled.
In laboratory dishes, the extracts slow the growth of some bacteria, such as Staphylococcus aureus. This does not mean the crushed leaf disinfects a wound. Plant material pressed into a cut can carry soil bacteria of its own.
Fresh leaf is the oldest and still the most common form. Shop-bought products are mostly dried leaf.
Forms you may meet:
- Fresh leaves, crushed or chewed, then pressed onto a cut. - A water decoction or tea made from leaves. - Dried leaf powder, loose or in capsules.
Less common forms:
- Creams, soaps and ointments made by small local makers. - Tinctures in alcohol, sold online. - Young shoots cooked and eaten as a vegetable.
Quality control is weak across all of these. Leaf collected from roadsides or treated farmland can carry lead, pesticide or mould. Capsules sold online are rarely tested by an outside lab.
The English name came from its best-known traditional job: slowing bleeding. Hunters, farmers and soldiers in West Africa were recorded packing crushed leaves onto fresh cuts in the field.
In Igbo medicine, Oro was also used for stomach pain, cough, sores and swelling. Midwives in some areas used it after childbirth. Herbalists in Ghana, Cameroon and Sierra Leone recorded similar uses.
Field workers have also seen chimpanzees swallow whole leaves of related Aspilia species. This is often quoted as proof of value in people. It is an animal behaviour note, not medical evidence.
These records tell you what people did. They do not tell you that it worked or that it was safe to do.
Stop using it and see a doctor if you get a rash, swelling or itching after contact.
Get medical help the same day if a wound shows spreading redness, pus, a bad smell, red streaks on the skin, or if you get a fever.
Go to an emergency department now if any of these happen:
- Bleeding does not stop after 10 minutes of firm pressure. - You have eye pain, blurred vision or light sensitivity after sap contact. - You vomit blood or pass black, tarry stools. - Your lips, tongue or throat swell, or you struggle to breathe.
It is not approved as a medicine in the UK, the US, the EU or Australia. Where it is sold, it is sold as a herbal supplement or plain dried herb, which means no agency has checked that it works. In Nigeria and nearby countries it is also treated as a common wild food and folk remedy.
Evidence grades and traditional-use labels are explained in our methodology. Nothing here is medical advice.
What it is typically used for, usual dose, cautions, and the study behind it where real trial data exists.
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