Passion Flower (Passiflora incarnata)

Available either as a dried herb or herbal tincture.

Please note this is a nutritional, functional horse food supplement and not veterinary medicine. See Dr Kellon's Horse Sense - 'Nutrition is not 'Alternative' Therapy.

Tincture

Our human-grade, certified organic tinctures give you a ready-to-absorb potent source of phytonutrients at the highest-strength available, for immediate absorption straight into the bloodstream and to the body’s cells.

100% certified organic pure tincture: Passiflora incarnata (Passion Flower) Herb, Infused 1:3 25% , Organic grown

Feed Guide

• Horse - 30-40ml / Pony - 15-20ml, daily in feed.
• Always shake the bottle to disperse any sediment.
• 3-year shelf-life.

Dried Herb

Produced to ecological standards and free from agro-chemicals.

Certified organic dried herb: Passiflora incarnata (Passion Flower) Herb , Organic cultivated , Origin France

Feed Guide

• 5g/100kg bodyweight per day, thus for an average 500kg horse add 25g daily to feed.
• 1-year shelf-life.

Contraindications

• Not to be used when competing under rules.

Functional Nutritional Value

Constituents: Flavonoids including apigenin, luteolin, scopoletin, 0.825% apigenin and luteolin glycosides, vitexin, isovitexin and their C-glycosides, kaempferol, quercetin, and rutin; maltol; cyanogenic glycosides (gynocardin) ; indole alkaloids including up to 0.1% – 0.9% harman alkaloids including harmane, harmaline, and harmol; amino acids (including GABA); fatty acids (including linoleic, linolenic, palmitic), phenolic acid; formic and butyric acids; coumarins; phytosterols; volatile oil .

NB. Our range of botanicals are all grown, harvested and dried without the use of agri-chemicals, non-irradiated and GMO free - see our Quality page for Quality Management & Certification Documents. Laboratory tested for identification and compliance to the British and European Pharmacopoeia standards, and are human grade. Please be aware that if you're purchasing our dried botanicals for human use, our dried range is cut to appropriate sizes for feeding to horses.

More ...

No doubt about it – the stunningly beautiful Passiflora incarnata plant species is held in high regard worldwide for its anxiolytic, anodyne, and sedative properties, with its specific influence over the nervous system and the many symptomatic/pathological manifestations of neurological disease and mental illness. As a result it’s now cultivated and utilised world-wide as an iconic nervine, sedative, and antispasmodic, offering effective influence over the nervous system and its many functions.

Passionflower is said to have a 'depressing' action (in the true sense of the word as is 'lowering', and not a trigger for misery ;-)) upon the reflex activity of the spinal cord, specifically on the medulla oblongata , a portion of the brainstem that oversees sleep, temporary fluctuations in blood pressure due to stress, and actions of the vagus nerve (specifically digestive and respiratory). Hence why it’s a well-recognised herb for insomnia due to anxiety, the symptoms of panic attacks (hyperventilation and palpitations), and restlessness/wakefulness as a result of exhaustion or debility.

It's said to enhance deeper respiration, lower the pulse, and reduce blood pressure, all three symptoms needing suppressing during acute anxiety states. It’s also suggested for use in childhood convulsions as a result of epilepsy or fever.

Eclectic literature shows wonderful descriptions of passionflower’s effects as being that it “promotes a peaceful, restful slumber, whereby the individual wakes well-rested and refreshed, and without disturbance to cerebral functions, dullness, or other disagreeable side effects”. Cut to our modern day, and passionflower’s efficacy in supporting sleep has also been studied in human clinical trials, proving its effectiveness in sleep benefits in healthy individuals with only mild fluctuations in sleep quality (Ngan & Conduit, 2011).

One of the interesting discussions about passionflower surrounds the debate on whether it should be considered narcotic in its actions. There are arguments against designating a narcotic action to the herb, stating its slow-acting influence as a nerve calmative, whereby rest results from a quieting influence and this restful state consequently allows for sleep.

Modern clinical trials have also negated a sedative effect based purely on a narcotic action, i.e. in a small placebo-controlled clinical trial including 36 participants diagnosed with generalised anxiety disorder (GAD), researchers discovered that Passiflora was as effective as oxazepam (a sedative benzodiazepine) in managing GAD and with lower incidence of job impairment performance (Akhondzadeh et al., 2001).

We could argue that if passionflower was truly narcotic in its actions, that there would be noticeable cognitive or functional impairment. Indeed, herbalist Matthew Wood states that passionflower actually increases concentration during waking by “cutting out excessive internal chatter,” but that it doesn’t induce drowsiness as would be expected from a herb with a truly narcotic action. The good news is that clinical research supports Wood’s conclusions (Movafegh et al., 2008).

Passionflower has also been showed to help individuals suffering from drug addiction and withdrawal symptoms, and who have difficulty sleeping as a consequence. It’s now recognised that constituents in passionflower binds to benzodiazepine and opioid receptor sites (Wolfman et al., 1994; Dhawan et al., 2001; Nassiri-Asl et al., 2007) and that this pharmacology highlights passionflower’s therapeutic potential in herbal protocols for assisting with opiate and benzodiazepine dependency, addiction, and withdrawal (Menzies-Trull, 2013).

These researchers concluded that passionflower is a safe and effective adjuvant in the treatment of opioid addiction and withdrawal (Akhondzadeh et al., 2001b).

We blend Passionflower into our CalmTonic , MellowMare & StressTonic. Just on a personal note, I keep a 100ml bottle of our CalmTonic tincture to hand at home and give myself a dose when I’m struggling to sleep or feeling the pressure. As an aside my elderly mother is in the early to moderate stages of Dementia and we’ve found our CalmTonic really beneficial for her to generally help to relax her when she’s in a state of panic, and gently bring her back to a state of lucidity.

Safety

• Passionflower is classified as safe.