At a glance: Ginger is the rhizome of Zingiber officinale Roscoe. It is both a food and a medicinal plant, but evidence depends strongly on preparation and indication. The European Medicines Agency’s 2025 revised assessment recognises well-established use of a specific powdered ginger preparation for prevention of nausea and vomiting in motion sickness, while several other uses remain in the traditional-use category.[1]
Botanical profile
- Accepted name: Zingiber officinale Roscoe.
- Common name: ginger.
- Family: Zingiberaceae.
- Medicinal part: rhizome.
- EMA herbal drug name: Zingiberis rhizoma.[1]
The medicinal “root” sold as ginger is botanically a rhizome: an underground stem rather than a true root.
Major constituent groups
Ginger contains pungent phenolic compounds and volatile terpenes. Important groups include:
- Gingerols, particularly 6-gingerol, prominent in fresh ginger.
- Shogaols, which increase when gingerols undergo dehydration during drying or heating.
- Paradols and zingerone, related pungent constituents and transformation products.
- Volatile oil terpenes, including compounds such as zingiberene and related sesquiterpenes.[2][3]
This changing chemistry is a useful reminder that fresh ginger, dried powder and a manufactured extract are not chemically identical interventions.
Traditional use
Ginger has been used for centuries across Asian, Middle Eastern and European traditions as a warming digestive and circulatory herb. Traditional uses include nausea, travel sickness, indigestion, poor appetite, abdominal discomfort and cold or sluggish digestion. It has also been used in warming preparations during colds and in formulas for aches and stiffness.
Contemporary herbal practice
Western herbalists commonly use ginger as a warming aromatic digestive: particularly where nausea, poor appetite, bloating or abdominal discomfort occur with a sense of cold or sluggish digestion. Small amounts may also be used as a circulatory or formula-enhancing herb, while larger medicinal doses are chosen for more specific indications such as nausea. Practitioner use therefore pays attention not only to the plant name but to fresh versus dried rhizome, preparation, dose and the overall pattern being treated.
Regulatory evidence: what does the EMA conclude?
The HMPC revised ginger monograph distinguishes between preparations and evidence categories. In the current assessment, powdered ginger has well-established use for prevention of nausea and vomiting in motion sickness, based on documented use and clinical studies. Other specified uses—including symptomatic relief of motion sickness, mild spasmodic gastrointestinal complaints with bloating and flatulence, temporary loss of appetite, minor articular pain and common-cold symptoms—are categorised as traditional use rather than indications established through clinical trials.[1]
Nausea and vomiting
Ginger is one of the better-studied herbs for nausea, but “nausea” is not one condition. Motion sickness, pregnancy-related nausea, postoperative nausea and chemotherapy-associated nausea have different evidence bases.
Research on pregnancy-associated nausea has repeatedly suggested benefit, particularly for nausea severity, although reviews note heterogeneity in preparations and study quality.[4][5] A 2024 umbrella review found that most included meta-analyses reported improvement in pregnancy nausea, but rated the underlying meta-analytic quality from critically low to low.[5]
An important regulatory nuance: pregnancy
Students should notice an apparent tension. Clinical literature includes trials and reviews of ginger for nausea in pregnancy, yet the current EMA public summary for authorised ginger-rhizome medicinal products states that those products should not be used during pregnancy or breastfeeding.[1]
That is not proof that one source is “wrong”. Regulatory monographs answer a specific licensing question for defined medicinal preparations and apply precautionary standards where data are considered insufficient for authorisation. Research reviews ask a different question about observed effects and harms in study populations. A good monograph reports both rather than erasing the disagreement.
Pharmacology
Proposed mechanisms for ginger’s antiemetic effects include effects on gastrointestinal motility and signalling pathways involving serotonin and other mediators. Gingerols and shogaols are prominent in mechanistic research, but the clinical effect of a whole preparation should not be reduced to a single molecule.[2]
The EMA notes that the precise mechanism in motion sickness is not fully known and that gastrointestinal motility may contribute.[1]
Preparations
Medicinal preparations include dried powdered rhizome and tinctures/extracts. Culinary fresh ginger, tea, capsules of powdered rhizome and concentrated extracts differ in composition and exposure. Clinical trial findings should therefore be linked to the preparation actually studied.
Safety
Reported adverse effects include gastrointestinal discomfort, heartburn, diarrhoea, mouth/throat irritation, nausea and occasional allergic reactions.[1][6] Food use and medicinal-dose supplementation should not be treated as equivalent exposures.
Interactions
The current EMA assessment states that no medicine interactions had been described in the literature at the time of its assessment for the defined ginger-rhizome medicinal products.[1] Other clinical resources still recommend medication review because concentrated herbal products can differ and because theoretical or emerging interaction concerns may not yet amount to documented clinical interactions.[6]
For students, “no described interaction” should never be paraphrased as “proven not to interact”.
Student note: common evidence traps
- Do not combine all forms of nausea into one outcome.
- Do not assume fresh culinary ginger is equivalent to a standardised trial product.
- Keep well-established use separate from traditional use in the EMA monograph.
- Do not conceal the tension between pregnancy trial literature and the current regulatory precaution.
- Mechanistic anti-inflammatory findings are not automatic evidence for clinical effectiveness in every inflammatory condition.
References
- European Medicines Agency, Committee on Herbal Medicinal Products. Zingiberis rhizoma — Zingiber officinale Roscoe, rhizoma. Revised EU herbal monograph and assessment report. EMA. Monograph revision published 2024 and updated 2025; public assessment summary updated March 2026.
- Mao Q-Q, Xu X-Y, Cao S-Y, et al. Bioactive compounds and bioactivities of ginger (Zingiber officinale Roscoe). Foods. 2019;8(6):185. PMC.
- Butt MS, Sultan MT. Ginger and its health claims: molecular aspects. In review literature summarised in: Ginger. PMC. Includes discussion of gingerols, shogaols, paradols and volatile constituents.
- Viljoen E, Visser J, Koen N, Musekiwa A. A systematic review and meta-analysis of the effect and safety of ginger in the treatment of pregnancy-associated nausea and vomiting. Nutrition Journal. 2014;13:20. PMC.
- Keenan K, et al. The use of ginger bioactive compounds in pregnancy: an evidence scan and umbrella review of existing meta-analyses. 2024. PMC.
- National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. Ginger: Usefulness and Safety. NCCIH. Consulted September 2026.
Additional materia medica sources
- ESCOP. Zingiberis rhizoma — Ginger rhizome, ESCOP Monographs.
- Blumenthal M, et al., eds. The Complete German Commission E Monographs. American Botanical Council; 1998.
- Mills S, Bone K. Principles and Practice of Phytotherapy: Modern Herbal Medicine. 2nd ed. Elsevier; 2013.
- Hoffmann D. Medical Herbalism. Healing Arts Press; 2003.
Last reviewed: 20 September 2026. Educational reference only; not an individual dosing or prescribing guide.
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