With the increased acceptance of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) within society, new research reflects deeper folk health histories beyond formal medical spaces. The contested relationships between formal and informal medicine have deep provenance and as scientific medicine began to professionalise in the 19th century, lay health knowledges were simultaneously absorbed and disempow...

Background. This study investigates the prevalence of and factors associated with users of folk therapy in Taiwan. Methods. Using data from the 2005 National Health Interview Survey and the National Health Insurance Research Database, we identified 16,750 adults aged 20 years and older. Sociodemographic factors, lifestyle, medical utilization, and health behaviors were compared between people u...

The study concerns the first -hand information on 50 ethnomedicinal plants traditional used by aborigines and rural folks of Nasik district, Maharashtra, for the treatment of various human ailments and disorders. The paper gives botanical identity, local name, family and mode of administration.

Labiatae family is well represented in Iran by 46 genera and 410 species and subspecies. Many members of this family are used in traditional and folk medicine. Also they are used as culinary and ornamental plants. There are no distinct references on the ethnobotany and ethnopharmacology of the family in Iran and most of the publications and documents related to the uses of these species are bot...

The antimicrobial activities of aqueous ethanol and chloroform extracts of three Baccharis species currently used in Northern Chile folk medicine for the treatment of several infectious and inflammatory disorders were tested against Gram-positive and negative bacteria and fungal spp. using the agar-disc diffusion assay. The results indicated that the activity was more pronounced against Gram-po...

The medicinal plants which are used by the village folk of Rayalaseema area for curing kidney ailments are reported in this paper. They are divided into two categories a) plant drugs which control urination and b) The plant drug which dissolves the stones of urinary bladder.

In a village compound built along a hillside in northern Utter Pradesh, Puskarji, a 90-year-old healer, told my research assistant, Jyoti, and I about a valuable book that he had once possessed. "My father had a book that was later lost. It was a published book with mantra cures for illnesses; every method of healing was in that book. My father got the book from a man who lived beyond Tehri, a ...