Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
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Ustilago maydis is a homeopathic remedy made from corn smut. Corn smut is a fungus that grows on ears of corn. In homeopathy it is given most often for heavy, dark or clotted menstrual bleeding.
The remedy is made by diluting the fungus over and over, with shaking at each step. At the usual 30C strength, none of the starting fungus is left. What you take is a sugar pellet or water that once touched that dilution.
Long use in one tradition is not proof that something works. Trials of homeopathy do not show an effect beyond a dummy pill (placebo). Read this page as a record of traditional use, not as proof of benefit.
There is no accepted way this remedy could act on the body at 30C, because no starting material is left.
Homeopaths explain it by "like cures like". Raw corn smut was once said to make the womb (uterus) cramp and bleed. So the diluted form is given to people with heavy bleeding and cramping.
Homeopaths also say the water or sugar keeps some trace or pattern of the fungus. Chemists and physicists have not found such a trace, and no test tells a 30C pill apart from a plain one.
A simpler reading is that people feel better because they expect to, because they get time and attention, and because many bleeding and cramping problems settle on their own. None of this needs the fungus to be present.
The most common form is a small sugar pellet. Strengths sold to the public are usually 6C, 30C or 200C.
Liquid drops in water and alcohol are also sold. A "mother tincture", written as Q or Ø, is the least diluted form and may still hold real fungal material. Low X strengths such as 1X and 3X sit close behind it.
Some combination products list Ustilago maydis alongside other remedies. Check the label so you know what strength you are buying.
Corn smut has been eaten in Mexico for centuries as huitlacoche, a prized food. That food use is separate from the homeopathic remedy.
American homeopaths brought it into their materia medica in the mid-1800s after a proving, which is a test where healthy people take a substance and write down what they feel. It became a small, well-known remedy for bleeding complaints.
It has stayed in homeopathic books ever since. Its standing rests on those case reports and provings, not on modern trials.
See a doctor within a few days if your periods have become much heavier, if you bleed between periods, or if you feel tired, pale, dizzy or short of breath.
Get urgent care the same day if you soak through a pad or tampon every hour for two hours or more, pass clots bigger than a golf ball, faint, or have severe belly pain.
Go to an emergency department for heavy bleeding in pregnancy, after childbirth or after a miscarriage. Any bleeding after your periods have stopped for good needs a doctor's appointment, even if it is light.
Stop the remedy and get help if you develop a rash, swollen lips or tongue, 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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