Long before there was pharmacology as we know it, the North American Indians cured illness and maintained health by natural means, using the healing plants of the forest, desert, and seashore. Their discoveries continue to have impact on modern medicine: over 25 percent of all prescription drugs contain plant derivatives, and the mainstream medical establishment is acknowledging the effectiveness of herbal remedies in treating certain illnesses. Earth Medicine, Earth Food is an A-to-Z reference to the plant remedies and wild foods used by the Indians. Organized by condition -- from allergies to female complaints to wounds -- it explains which plants were used by different tribes to treat specific maladies, how they were prepared, and how to identify them in the wild. You'll learn that: -- The Catawba Indians treated back pain with a tea of arnica roots -- The Iroquois and Mohegans used the boneset weed for colds and fever -- The Blackfoot Indians applied a paste of scarlet mallow to burns as a cooling agent -- The Menominees cured insomnia with a tea steeped from the leaves of the partridge berry plant -- The Onondagas drank pennyroyal tea for headache Earth Medicine, Earth Food also discusses non-animal food sources consumed by the Indians such as nuts, seeds, berries, and ferns, and examines the relevance of traditional dietary patterns to the way we eat now. With over 160 detailed illustrations of plants as they are found in nature, Earth Medicine, Earth Food belongs on your shelf next to such works as Food and Healing Traditional Foods Are Your Best Medicine, and guides to Chinese medicine.

Herbal Drug for the Management of Infectious Diseases The book is a comprehensive compilation of herbal drug applications for the treatment and management of infectious diseases and addresses issues related to development, challenges, and future prospects associated with the use of herbal medicine. The use of herbal medicines has evolved in various cultures around the world over many millennia. In many developing Asian and African countries, the use of herbal medicines, as supplied by traditional medicinal practitioners, has always been popular. In the last two to three decades, many people in developed countries have begun to turn to alternative or complementary therapies, including the use of herbal medicines, nutraceuticals, functional foods, and other supplements. This resurgence in interest in plant-derived medicines is partly due to the growing dissatisfaction with allopathic medicines, as well as the perception that plant-derived medicines are natural and therefore pure and without side effects, and the progress in the production of higher quality herbal medicines including some with proven clinical efficacy and safety. Infectious diseases are generally caused by pathogenic microorganisms, like bacteria, viruses, parasites, or fungi, and are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Therefore, the 16 chapters of this book have been intentionally sequenced to cover the therapeutic potential and applications of herbal extracts and phytochemicals for the management of various infectious diseases. Disease pathophysiology, an overview of current medication or treatment, in-vitro and in-vivo evaluations of relevant biological activities of herbal extracts and phytochemicals, mechanisms of action, clinical trials, and novel technologies for the delivery of herbal bioactive compounds as well as patents have also been included. Audience Chemists, pharmaceutical scientists, biologists, herbal/Ayurvedic/medicinal practitioners, as well all those in the medical sciences working on medicinal plants and infectious diseases.

Includes a selective bibliography of literature, with annotated citations categorized by crop usage for food, medicine, & other purposes; & a list of germplasm & data sources for some important native plants. Intended as a resource for agricultural scientists involved in such diverse fields as plant genetics, conservation, sustainable agriculture, ethnobotany & ethnopharmacology, cultural anthropology, & other related disciplines.

Herbal and Magical Medicine draws on perspectives from folklore, anthropology, psychology, medicine, and botany to describe the traditional medical beliefs and practices among Native, Anglo- and African Americans in eastern North Carolina and Virginia. In documenting the vitality of such seemingly unusual healing traditions as talking the fire out of burns, wart-curing, blood-stopping, herbal healing, and rootwork, the contributors to this volume demonstrate how the region’s folk medical systems operate in tandem with scientific biomedicine. The authors provide illuminating commentary on the major forms of naturopathic and magico-religious medicine practiced in the United States. Other essays explain the persistence of these traditions in our modern technological society and address the bases of folk medical concepts of illness and treatment and the efficacy of particular pratices. The collection suggests a model for collaborative research on traditional medicine that can be replicated in other parts of the country. An extensive bibliography reveals the scope and variety of research in the field. Contributors. Karen Baldwin, Richard Blaustein, Linda Camino, Edward M. Croom Jr., David Hufford, James W. Kirland, Peter Lichstein, Holly F. Mathews, Robert Sammons, C. W. Sullivan III

A rare and inspiring guide to the health and well-being of Aboriginal women and their communities. The process of “digging up medicines” - of rediscovering the stories of the past - serves as a powerful healing force in the decolonization and recovery of Aboriginal communities. In Life Stages and Native Women, Kim Anderson shares the teachings of fourteen elders from the Canadian prairies and Ontario to illustrate how different life stages were experienced by Metis, Cree, and Anishinaabe girls and women during the mid-twentieth century. These elders relate stories about their own lives, the experiences of girls and women of their childhood communities, and customs related to pregnancy, birth, post-natal care, infant and child care, puberty rites, gender and age-specific work roles, the distinct roles of post-menopausal women, and women’s roles in managing death. Through these teachings, we learn how evolving responsibilities from infancy to adulthood shaped women’s identities and place within Indigenous society, and were integral to the health and well-being of their communities. By understanding how healthy communities were created in the past, Anderson explains how this traditional knowledge can be applied toward rebuilding healthy Indigenous communities today.