Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
Track Shohangekabukuryoto with reminders and record whether it helped, in the app.
Shohangekabukuryoto is a Japanese Kampo herb mix. It has just three parts: pinellia tuber, poria (a fungus), and fresh ginger. People take it for nausea and vomiting.
It is one of the 148 Kampo formulas on Japan's MHLW NHI-approved list. Doctors in Japan can prescribe it, and health insurance pays for it. In Japan it is best known for morning sickness, the nausea of early pregnancy.
The honest verdict: the traditional record is long, but good human trials are thin. Long use tells you a remedy is trusted. It does not prove that it works.
No one has shown how this mix works in the body.
Kampo theory blames nausea on fluid that pools in the stomach and pushes up. Pinellia and poria are said to move that fluid out. Ginger is said to warm the stomach and settle it.
Lab and animal work gives a few hints. Parts of ginger may calm the gut and quiet the nerves that set off vomiting. Pinellia has cut vomiting in animal tests.
Those are clues, not proof in people. Treat any talk of a mechanism as a theory.
In Japan it comes as a dry granule powder in single-dose packets. This is the form a doctor prescribes. It is often stirred into warm water and sipped.
Outside Japan you may find capsules, loose powder or a tea you brew. Strength varies a lot between brands. Check the label for the amount of each herb.
The recipe comes from the Jin Gui Yao Lue, a Chinese medical text from about 200 CE. Japanese doctors took it up, and it became a fixture of Kampo practice. It has been used for well over a thousand years for vomiting, and in Japan for morning sickness.
See a doctor if vomiting lasts more than two days, if you cannot keep fluids down, or if you are peeing much less than usual. Get help the same day for a rash, yellow skin or eyes, dark urine, or deep tiredness while taking it. Go to emergency if your vomit has blood in it or looks like coffee grounds, if you have severe belly pain, or if a child is limp, floppy or very drowsy.
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.
One email with the summary. We'll also send a short weekly evidence update — unsubscribe any time.
