Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
Track Post-e-Bargad with reminders and record whether it helped, in the app.
Post-e-Bargad is the dried bark of the banyan tree (Ficus benghalensis), used as a single drug in Persian and Unani medicine. Healers have given it mainly as a water decoction (a liquid made by simmering the bark) for loose stools, dysentery (diarrhoea with blood or mucus), and as a mouth rinse for sore or bleeding gums.
It is also a folk remedy for high blood sugar, for vaginal discharge, and as a wash for slow-healing wounds. In Unani terms it is classed as cooling, drying and astringent, meaning it tightens tissue.
Here is the honest verdict up front: almost all of the supporting work is laboratory and animal research, and we could not identify good human trials. Long traditional use tells you people have relied on it for centuries; it is not proof that it works, and that point is not repeated in later sections.
The most likely explanation is simple chemistry, not a special action. Banyan bark is rich in tannins, plant compounds that bind protein and make tissue contract and weep less. That could plausibly firm up loose stools and calm irritated gums, which matches how the bark has always been used.
For blood sugar, animal studies suggest extracts of the bark may slow how fast sugar is absorbed or nudge insulin (the hormone that moves sugar out of the blood) activity. This has not been confirmed in people, so treat it as an unproven idea rather than a mechanism you can rely on.
Because tannins bind things in the gut, they can also bind medicines and minerals you swallow at the same time. That is a real and predictable effect, and it is the main reason to space the bark away from other tablets.
You will most often meet it as one of these:
Dried bark pieces for making a decoction (simmered water extract).
Coarse powder (safoof) taken by the spoonful or stirred into water.
Compound Unani syrups, tablets and churna blends in which banyan bark is one ingredient among several.
A cooled decoction used as a mouth rinse, gargle or external wash.
Banyan bark has a long record in South Asian medicine. Unani physicians in Persia and India adopted it as Post-e-Bargad, and Ayurvedic texts describe the same tree as Nyagrodha with overlapping uses for diarrhoea, discharge and wounds.
It remains a common shop item in Unani and Ayurvedic dispensaries across India and Pakistan today.
See a doctor straight away if diarrhoea lasts more than two days, or if you see blood or black colour in the stool, or if you have a high fever, severe stomach pain, or signs of dehydration such as very little urine, dizziness or a dry mouth.
If you have diabetes, get help urgently for shaking, sweating, confusion or feeling faint, which can mean your blood sugar has dropped too low.
Also get checked if gum bleeding keeps returning, if vaginal discharge has an odour or comes with itching or pain, or if a wound spreads, swells or oozes pus. Stop the bark and seek care if you develop a rash, swelling of the face or lips, or trouble breathing.
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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