Obscure Traditional Herb Beats Drug for Osteoarthritis

Dwarf elder (Sambucus ebulus) is a relative of the more common elder (Sambucus nigra) that is used in the treatment of cold and flu. According to Maud Grieve’s A Modern Herbal, it differs from the better known elder in that it does not have a hard stem and dies back to the ground every year, making it, truly, a herb. She says that its old name, Danewort, comes from the antique belief that it sprang from the blood of Danes slain in battle. That’s the old belief. The new belief is not that it comes from pain, but that it cures pain. Modern research is showing that, when used topically, dwarf elder is better than drugs for treating osteoarthritits. . . .

Traditional Persian medicine has long used dwarf elder leaf to treat joint pain and disorders of the joints and bones. The traditional use was recently put to the test in a double-blind study on knee osteoarthritis that compared the herb to a drug.

Seventy people with mild to moderate osteoarthritis in their knees were given either a gel made of 10% dwarf elder extract that had been standardized for 3.3% phenols or 1% diclofenac gel. The gel was applied to the arthritic knee 3 times a day for 4 weeks.

Both treatments produced significant improvement. But the herbal treatment was superior to the pharmaceutical treatment. Scores for total pain, total score on the WOMAC osteoarthritis index and self-rated scores for pain were all significantly better in the dwarf elder group.

The authors say that the dwarf elder gel improved all of knee joint pain, physical function and stiffness. What is remarkable about this study is that, for many people with osteoarthritis, diclofenac is the first-line treatment. That means that this little known traditional herb may be better than the best topical pharmaceutical treatment of osteoarthritis.

J Ethnopharmacol 2016;188:80-86

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