High fever, urination difficulty treated with TCM Lumbricus

What's Lumbricus (Di Long)? First don’t mistaken it as Geosaurus just because they share the same name of Dilong in Chinese. Instead in TCM it means the dried body of Lumbricus kwangtungensis from Guangdong and Guangxi and Lumbricus nativus mainly from Qinghai, Henan, Shandong, and Shanxi. In addition, the former refers to Pheretima asiatica Michaelsen in the family Megascolecidae, which is generally considered of better quality. The latter comes in many varieties but Allolobophora caliginosa trapezoides are most common, and others include Pheretima vulgaris Chen, Pheretima guillelmi (Michaelsen), and Pheretima pectinifera Michaelsen.

Pheretima asiatica Michaelsen is in the shape of flaky elongated strip, twisted, 10 to 20cm in length, 1 to 2cm in width. Head and tail remains the original shape – slightly pointed front and blunt end. The whole body surface is with dense segments, among which the light-color segment between 14 to 16 segments is often called "white neck". Back is brown or gray-red and belly is yellow brown. It is fishy, slightly salty, lightweight, brittle, easily broken, with thick wall and white section.

Main chemical constituents of Pheretima asiatica Michaelsen and Allolobophora caliginosa trapezoides include hemolysis ingredient of lumbritin, antipyretic ingredient of lumbrofebin, toxic ingredient of terrestro-lumbrilysin, hypoxanthine, xanthine, adenine, guanine, guanidine, choline, alanine, valine, leucine, phenylalanine, tyrosine, lysine, and other amino acids.

Lumbricus health benefits
Lumbricus is one of important Chinese herbs, which is initially mentioned in Shen Nong Ben Cao Jing (Divine Farmer’s Materia Medica), the earliest Chinese pharmacy monograph, which recorded only 67 kinds of medicinal ingredients from animals. There this herb was classified into low-grade category.

Modern pharmacological actions
1. Its decoction and lumbrofebin have excellent antipyretic antipyretic effect;
2. Both its hot water extract and alcohol extract have sedative, anticonvulsant effect on mice and rabbits;
3. Pheretima hypoxanthine has a significant role on bronchial relaxation and antagonizes the bronchial contraction induced by histamine and pilocarpine;
4. Pheretima products, including tinctures, powder injectable suspension, hot water extract, decoction, etc., have slow and long-lasting antihypertensive effect;
5. Lumbricus extract exact has fibrinolytic and anticoagulant effect;
6. In addition, it also enhances immunity, fights against tumor, antagonizes bacteria, promotes diuresis, and excites uterine and intestinal smooth muscle.