Best First Aid Salve
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What is the best first aid salve? That’s a tough question to answer because salves can be used to address many common first aid issues, and no one salve is going to be the best for every person and every situation. Some people are allergic to certain herbs that other people aren’t, for example, so a salve that works incredibly well for one person may be harmful to another person. I’ve formulated and made many salves to be used for first aid purposes, and each time I experiment, what I find is that no one salve is going to be the absolute best for every circumstance. With this in mind, I currently have two salves for sale that at my Etsy Shop, but in the future I will offer other formulations in small batches - some will be general purpose type salves and others will be more focused in their intended use.
Right now, I offer a Calendula & Plantain Salve and a Lavender Salve. While there is overlap in what they are “good for,” the Calendula & Plantain Salve has been formulated more with minor cuts, scrapes, scratches, bug bites, bee stings, and rashes in mind, while the Lavender Salve was formulated primarily with minor burns in mind. I could’ve created one salve with Calendula, Plantain, and Lavender, and I have done that in the past, but the reason why I didn’t do that this time is because the more ingredients in a salve, the less of each ingredient there is, thus making the potency of each ingredient less. For example, the Lavender Salve is made using 100% Lavender bud infused oil, allowing the Lavender to shine, while the Calendula & Plantain Salve is half Calendula infused oil and half Plantain infused oil, pairing two herbs that really do play well together in a formula. However, if I made a salve that was 1/3 Calendula, 1/3 Plantain, and 1/3 Lavender, while the salve would include three different herb infused oils, there would be less of each.
I want my Lavender Salve to excel at assisting with the smarting pain of a minor burn. Therefore, I make it with 100% Lavender infused oil. Sure, Calendula and Plantain can be very helpful with burns, too, but they don’t help with that annoying pain like Lavender does. With a minor burn, such as touching a hot oven rack for just a fraction of a second, I don’t need a salve that will help “heal” the burn, as there’s nothing to heal; I just want that annoying, smarting pain to go away. If, however, it’s a more serious burn, first I might apply the Lavender Salve to help the pain go away, and then later I might apply the Calendula & Plantain Salve to assist with healing, as both Calendula and Plantain work excellently with many common skin conditions.
If I cut myself with a knife while slicing onions, let’s say, there’d be nothing particularly wrong with applying the Lavender Salve, especially if the cut hurts, but if I just want a salve to help the wound close and heal, I’d reach first for the Calendula & Plantain Salve, as the Calendula and Plantain would probably serve me better in that capacity than Lavender would. I suppose that part of the equation is just knowing which salve works best for me under certain circumstances. If you’d like to learn more about herbs and how they may be beneficial, I’ll link to two excellent books that I highly recommend just below.
Years ago I made a salve that I called “Kitchen Sink Salve,” as I included about a dozen herbs in it. If I recall, it had Calendula, Plantain, Lavender, Yarrow, Chaparral, Myrrh, Echinacea, Oregon Grape Root, and Comfrey infused Coconut Oil and a slew of Essential Oils, including Tea Tree, Manuka, Oregano, Lavender, and Helichrysum italicum. I was pretty happy with it, as it really did cover a lot of practical applications. However, making such an “all purpose” or “multipurpose” salve meant that it was created to be a generalist and not a specialist. It was decent for a lot of applications, but no single herb or pair of herbs really shined. There’s nothing wrong with such a formula, but I’ve been trying to make salves that are much simpler these days, letting the concentration of a single herb or two (or maybe three) do the heavy lifting and pairing those infused herbs with a simple selection of one or two essential oils that I think complement them.
In the near future I will be releasing a few new salves, and when I do, I’ll be making them in small batches and they’ll be available at my Etsy Shop. Are my first aid salves the best? Is there such a thing as the best first aid salve? I don’t know, but the way that I look at all of my products is like this: I’m making these products for me, my family, and my friends. If it’s not good enough, then shame on me!
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