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Original Articles:
Betül Demirci, Dietrich H. Paper, Fatih Demirci, K. Hüsnü Can Baser, and Gerhard Franz
Essential Oil of Betula pendula Roth. Buds
eCAM 2004; 1: 301-303 [Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]
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[Read eLetter] Errrors in article
Martin Watt   (14 April 2005)

Errrors in article 14 April 2005
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Martin Watt,
Essential oils data publisher
Blackmore, UK, CM4 OSE

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Re: Errrors in article

This paper has merits as an academic study of the fractions extracted from Betula Pendula buds. However, in several respects it is misleading, particularly for practitioners of Complementary Medicine. I question if this journal should publish such studies when there is no close connection between the research and traditional medicine.

1. The authors give references on the traditional uses of Birch. However, there is no clear link between the use of a herbal tea or tincture in phytotherapy, with the extract that they produced. In a traditional herbal preparation the main active ingredients can be water soluble only, and they may not occur in the same plants essential oil. On the other hand, so called "birch oil" in the marketplace is totally different to the lab extracts obtained by these authors. Therefore, their extract is only remotely related to the traditional uses the authors claim for birch buds.

2. The authors cite the use of birch oil in cosmetic and flavouring due to its characteristic fragrance. Any birch oil used in such products typically contains over 90% methyl salicylate which gives the characteristic fragrance. ** The analysis made by these authors of their extract is lacking in that chemical. **

3. Birch wood does not posses oil bearing glands and therefore the extract commonly referred to as "birch oil" is a misnomer. Commercial birch oil (if is is genuine which it frequently is not) is made via enzymatic conversion of the starting materials and is no more 'natural' than coal tar in my view. If birch buds possess oil glands I do not know, but if they do, there has been no commercial extraction or traditional use of that essential oil or oil extract.

4. Whatever the extract produced by these authors could be called, it has unknown safety and no traditional uses.

I would therefore urge traditional therapists to treat such academic exercises as of vague interest rather than trying to use them as justification for the efficacy of certain extracts. Good science can be great to confirm traditional uses, but this paper is weak in that regard.

Martin Watt (UK) http://www.aromamedical.com

Conflict of Interest:

None declared