Re: Use Of Alcohol In Tincture-Making

When I was researching oleander extract awhile back I found that virtually all of the effective extracts were aqueous ones - that is to say, they were made by the boiling and straining of raw oleander.  Then a version came along that claimed to be superior because it was made using ethanol, and thus extracted more of some of the primary ingredients, especially the non-polar (non water soluable) cardiac glycosides.  At first, the claims seemed to make sense, but in real world use, the ethanol extract proved to be far less effective, at least for cancer.

After a bit of further research, I found some information from the American Botanical Council that confirmed what I suspected:  although alcohol extraction may get more of certain ingredients, especially the non-polar ones, it also resulted in a loss of polar compounds which precipitate out during the extraction process, and thus in some instances, such as oleander, important supporting compounds (such as the long-chain polysacharrides in oleander) were being lost.

I guess the bottom line is that in general alcohol may be best for preparing tinctures and extracts, but there are exceptions.  One wonders how we are to know?  I surely don't have the knowledge or means to do so - but whenever I find an extract or natural decoction made by the aqueous method with a history of successful use, I tend to think there might be a good reason to stick with that version, or else go back to it if another version does not appear to work as well.

DQ