By Crystal Gwizdala
Q: With all the hype about essential oils, is there any truth behind any of them helping or having health benefits?
A: Yes, actually. So we think essential oils are new, but they’ve actually been used as medicine, spices and perfumes for thousands of years according to the fourth edition of “Organic Chemistry” by John McMurray.
Q: So what is an essential oil?
A: Let me first start by saying how they’re made. Usually, they make them through steam distillation. So you get a bunch of the plant material – whether it’s leaves, bark or flower petals – and you get a steamer. The steam passes through the plant material and that steam gets cooled until it condenses back into a liquid, which is “essential oil.” Essential oils are usually so delicate that if you do any other type of distillation, you just destroy them completely. It has to be a very gentle process. That’s the most common method, but some essential oils are made through mechanical extractions, such as the citruses. Just like how we make olive oil.
Q: Is olive oil an essential oil?
A: I guess you could call it that, I suppose.
Q: So since they have to do a steam process to get these oils, is it like Lacroix, with a hint of a hint of stuff?
A: The point of distillation is to get a pure extract, so doing a distillation gets you the purest form. But going back to your original question, an essential oil is made up of terpenes, this family of small carbon-containing molecules. And carbon is the element of life. So it’s just these little tiny molecules in the plants, but they’re also in animals. One of the terpenes is actually a precursor to make steroids.
Q: So how is it useful for your body?
A: There’s not a lot of good research for it being a treatment for much of anything.
Q: So you can’t rub it on a dead bird and bring it back to life? That’s just for coconut oil?
A: Right, right (please note the sarcasm). Something I did find in the fifth edition of “Practical Management of Pain” by Benzon et al. though is that certain oils can actually relieve muscle pain and joint pain, such as menthol or mint oil.
Q: Like an Icy Hot Patch.
A: Right. It works as a counterirritant, which means that rubbing this stuff directly on your skin irritates it. That irritation excites and inhibits pain receptors on your skin, which then sends signals up to your brain to block the pain. You may have also seen camphor oil used to treat mosquito bites; it’s also a counterirritant. But don’t rub concentrated oil on your skin, it can cause severe irritation or allergic reactions. And definitely don’t rub it on your children – their skin is too delicate.
Q: I’m surprised that there’s actually science behind it!
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