Dai Zhe Shi
Do not self-treat with Dai Zhe Shi
Practitioner-prepared only. Your practitioner should know where the mineral came from.
If this is an emergency
Some reactions to Dai Zhe Shi need urgent care. Call your local emergency number or go to an emergency department straight away — do not wait to see whether it passes.
Who should avoid Dai Zhe Shi?
- Do not use if you are pregnant: this ban is absolute, at any dose, in any formula
- Do not use if you are breastfeeding
- Do not use if you are giving it to a child
- Do not use if you have haemochromatosis or any other condition that stores too much iron in the body
- Do not use if you have known lead or arsenic poisoning, or raised blood levels of either metal
- Do not use if you have long-term kidney disease (kidneys that no longer filter waste well)
- Do not use if you have liver disease
- Do not use if you take a tetracycline or quinolone antibiotic, levothyroxine (a thyroid pill), levodopa, or a bisphosphonate (a bone drug), unless your doctor has agreed a plan
- Do not use if you take iron pills or an iron tonic already
- Do not use if you have weak digestion with cold hands and loose stools, a long-standing caution in Chinese practice
- Do not use it for months on end, and never from a source that has not been tested for arsenic and lead
When should you see a doctor?
Stop and call a doctor if you vomit blood, pass black tarry stools, or have bad belly pain.
Get urgent care for signs of metal poisoning: numbness or tingling in hands and feet, muscle weakness, confusion, repeated vomiting, or a metal taste in your mouth.
See a doctor rather than treating yourself if hiccups last more than 48 hours, if vomiting will not stop, or if dizziness comes with chest pain, slurred speech or a weak arm or leg.
- What it is: A crushed iron ore, hematite, used as a single herb in Chinese medicine to settle belching, hiccups and vomiting.
- Active ingredients: Iron oxide, Trace silicon, aluminium, magnesium, calcium, Possible arsenic and lead as contaminants
- Side effects: Constipation and stomach upset are common; toxic metal build-up is the serious long-term risk.
- Pregnancy & breastfeeding: Avoid in pregnancy and while breastfeeding.
Educational information, not medical advice — ask your doctor or midwife.
What is Dai Zhe Shi?
Dai Zhe Shi is a mineral, not a plant. It is hematite, a red-brown iron ore that is crushed to a powder. In Chinese medicine it is a single drug (a TCM herb used on its own), and it is also known as Hematite.
It is used mainly for things that move up when they should move down. That means belching, hiccups, reflux, nausea and vomiting. It is also used for dizziness and for some kinds of bleeding, such as nosebleeds.
Here is the short verdict. It has a long record in one tradition, but we found no human trials of it. Long traditional use does not prove that a remedy works, so read the rest of this page with that in mind.
How does Dai Zhe Shi work?
No one has shown how Dai Zhe Shi acts in the body. The old idea is simple. The mineral is heavy, so it is said to push rising qi (the body's flow of energy) back down.
A more modern guess is chemical. The stone is mostly iron oxide, which barely dissolves. Small amounts may soak up stomach acid, a bit like a weak antacid (an acid-soothing medicine).
Lab and animal work has looked at its effects on the gut and on blood. That work cannot tell you what happens in people. Treat any mechanism you read as an idea, not a fact.
What forms does Dai Zhe Shi come in?
You will almost never take this mineral on its own. Most people meet it inside a mixed herb tea, called a decoction.
Raw Dai Zhe Shi is broken into small pieces. It is boiled first for 20 to 30 minutes, before the other herbs go in.
Calcined Dai Zhe Shi is heated until red hot, then dipped in vinegar. This makes it easy to grind and gentler on the stomach. It is the usual form when bleeding is the target.
It also turns up in ready-made pills and powders. Xuan Fu Dai Zhe Tang is the best known old formula that contains it.
Where it comes from:
Dai Zhe Shi appears in the Shen Nong Ben Cao Jing, a Chinese drug text from roughly 2,000 years ago. Zhang Zhongjing used it in Han dynasty formulas for belching and vomiting.
It has stayed in Chinese practice ever since. It is not part of Western herbal medicine or of Ayurveda.
What does Dai Zhe Shi help with?
- Hiccups that will not stop: This is the classic use. Chinese texts have used it for stubborn hiccups for centuries, almost always inside a formula. We found no human trials that test it for hiccups.
- Belching and reflux: Old texts group belching and reflux with hiccups as qi moving the wrong way. The mineral may soak up a little stomach acid, but that idea has not been tested in people.
- Nausea and vomiting: It is used for vomiting that keeps coming back, often with ginger and other herbs. Evidence here is traditional. No trial we could find compares it with a dummy treatment.
- Dizziness and a heavy, pounding head: Chinese practice uses it for what is called rising liver yang, which covers dizziness, ringing ears and headache. Some of these people have hypertension (high blood pressure). It is not a treatment for high blood pressure, and it has not been tested as one.
- Nosebleeds and heavy periods (traditional use only): The calcined form is used to slow bleeding. This is a traditional use with no human trial support. Heavy or repeated bleeding needs a doctor, not a herb.
What are the side effects of Dai Zhe Shi?
- Constipation
- Stomach ache or a heavy, full feeling
- Loss of appetite
- Nausea
- Dark stools, from the iron
- Build-up of arsenic or lead with long use
- Too much iron in the body with long use
Good to know:
Short courses mostly cause gut upset: constipation, a heavy stomach and poor appetite. These fade when you stop.
The serious risk comes from long or repeated use. Some hematite carries arsenic and lead, and both can damage nerves, kidneys and blood. Signs build slowly, so people often miss them.
This is why the safety tier on this page is high-risk, even though a single short course is usually tolerated.
Options to discuss with a clinician
If hiccups, belching or nausea are the problem, gentler options exist. Ginger tea is one. Tangerine peel (Chen Pi) and bamboo shavings (Zhu Ru) are milder herbs used in Chinese practice for the same complaints.
Ask a clinician, or a trained Chinese medicine doctor, which of these might suit you. Simple steps may help too, such as smaller meals and slow sips of warm drinks. A doctor can also look for a cause that needs treatment of its own.
Graded pages for the options named above:
Review status
This page has not been signed off by a pharmacist and is not published. It is shown here for a policy decision only.