PHARMACOGNOSY Info
The study of medicinal plants and their properties is called pharmacognosy. This science has led to the development of many drugs in use today including aspirin (the basic salicylate structure was discovered from the white willow while aspirin was synthesized from meadowsweet), opioids (originally from opium poppies), the birth control pill (synthesized from steroid structures found in a wild Mexican yam), and chemotherapeutic agents like vincristine and vinblastine (from Madagascar periwinkle) or taxol (from the Pacific yew tree).
Today, herbal medicine is big business. However, there is much confusion about what herbal medicine is and is not. While pharmacognosy is a science that deals with the discovery of medicines from natural substances, it is certainly not the same as herbalism.
According to the American Society of Pharmacognosy, its scope includes ‘the study of the physical, chemical, biochemical and biological properties of drugs, drug substances, or potential drugs or drug
substances of natural origin as well as the search for new drugs from natural sources. Research problems in pharmacognosy include studies in the areas of phytochemistry, microbial chemistry, biosynthesis, biotransformation, chemotaxonomy, and other biological and chemical sciences’.
The term herbalism refers to a folk and traditional medicinal practice based on the use of plants and plant extracts. In essence, herbalism is the practice of herb-based care and pharmacognosy is the scientific study of herbs with medicinal purposes. Within the practice of herbalism there are a variety of different traditions including, for example, traditional Chinese medicine or the Indian ayurvedic medicine.
Each of these has a unique paradigm on health, illness, and disease. Unlike pharmacognosists, herbalists are not particularly interested in specific active constituents found within a plant. Instead, they focus on the healing properties of the plant or part of plant (seed, root, leaf, etc.) and how it will benefit the body to heal itself.
Although non-herbalists may also use herbal medicines in their clinical practice, they likely do so under a different health paradigm. Homeopaths also have a holistic approach to health, but their material medica uses a ‘like cures like’ philosophy of treating patients with ultra-dilute formulations unlikely to contain significant (if any) ‘active’ ingredient.
Homeopathy, then, is unlike herbal medicine, herbalism, or pharmacognosy. The current trend in natural product use follows many different health paradigms – some are popular because of their use in traditional Chinese medicine or Ayurveda, some from the widespread use of herbal medicine in Europe, and some due to increasing published studies on natural medicines, somewhat representative of the renewed interest in pharmacognosy.
So, irrespective of the particular health paradigm from which the natural health products summarized in this text are derived, we will adopt the pharmacology perspective (or perhaps in this case, pharmacognosy would be the more accurate term). As such, individual constituents (chemical entities) of each natural product are discussed with regard to their pharmacologic or toxicologic properties.
If symptoms persists consult you doctors!
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