Blumea balsamifera - Ngai Camphor

Ngai Camphor is a shrub or subshrub, perennial, erect, 1-3 m tall. Stems are corymbosely branched, woody at base; bark grayish brown; branches round, densely woolly-hairy with yellowish white hairs. Leaves are narrowly oblong, 15-18 x 3.5-5 cm, below densely silky-woolly, above rugose and hairy with blunt multicellular hairs, base narrowed, eared, ears 10-12 mm on short leaf-stalk, margin minutely toothed to sawtoothed usually with upcurved teeth, tip tapering; veins 10-12 pairs. Flower-heads 6-7 mm, in spreading pyramidal panicles, stalked. Involucres bell-shaped; phyllaries in 3 or 4 series, densely woolly on outer surface, outer ones smaller, oblong-lanceshaped 1-3 mm, compressed, inner longer, linear 5-6 mm. Receptacle 2.5-3 mm in diam., flat, alveolate, hairless. Marginal florets thread-like, to 6 mm, 2-4-lobed. Central florets yellow, tubular, 6-7 mm, lobes papillate, with stalkless glands and sparse multicellular hairs. Achenes brown, round, oblong, about 1 mm, sparsely hairy. The Bodos of Assam use it as a flavoring herb and add it to soups, chicken, curries, and also as a side dish with chillies and native soda ash water called kharwi. Ngai Camphor is found in dry fields, thickets, grasslands, mountain slopes, riverbanks; below 1200 m, throughout the Indian subcontinent, including lower Himalayas, and SE Asia. Flowering: November-December.
Medicinal uses: Warning: Unverified information

In Philippines, Ngai Camphor is primarily used as a diuretic (or "water pill") and to treat symptoms of the common cold. As a diuretic, it is a herb used to treat urinary tract or kidney stones and urinary tract infections, and thus reduces high blood pressure.