WHO Expert Monographs on Selected Medicinal Plants - v. 1

A collection of 28 monographs covering the quality control and traditional and clinical uses of selected medicinal plants.

Plants were selected for inclusion on the basis of their widespread use, particularly in countries that rely heavily on medicinal plants to meet primary healthcare needs. Each monograph follows a standard format, with information presented in two parts.

The first gives pharmacopoeical summaries for quality assurance, botanical features, distribution, identity tests, purity requirements, chemical assays, and active or major chemical constituents.

A section on definition provides the Latin binomial pharmacopoeical name, the most important criterion in quality assurance.

Latin pharmacopoeical synonyms and vernacular names, listed in the section on synonyms and selected vernacular names, are those names used in commerce or by local consumers. The second part of each monograph begins with a list of dosage forms and of medicinal uses categorized as uses supported by clinical data, uses described in pharmacopoeias and in traditional systems of medicine, and uses described in folk medicine, but not yet supported by experimental or clinical use data.

Each monograph also includes a review of available data on experimental and clinical pharmacology, followed by information on contraindications, such as sensitivity or allergy, warnings, precautions, particularly in special groups such as pregnant and breast-feeding women, adverse reactions, and dosage.

A list of references concludes the monograph.