Plants and Indigenous Medicine and Diet: Biobehavioral Approaches (Plants in Indigenous Medicine & Diet)

First Published in 1986. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company. Humans have long been acute observers of their biological surroundings and have been involved in dynamic relationships with ambient flora and fauna since the development of the earliest medical systems and food-getting technologies. Human-plant interactions can, then, be viewed as one expression of a population's encounter with their environment and have been the subject of considerable interest in various disciplines which seek to understand how the use of plants affects patterns of health and disease. The aim of this volume is to promote a bio-behavioral focus for indigenous plant research Cover Half Title Title Copyright Contributors to This Volume Dedication CONTENTS Preface PART ONE THE IMPORTANCE OF MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACHES TO PLANT USE Chapter One Multidisciplinary Perspectives in the Interpretation of Plants Used in Indigenous Medicine and Diet PART TWO CRITERIA USED IN THE SELECTION OF MEDICINAL PLANTS Editor's Introduction to Part Two Chapter Two Herbal Emmenagogues Used by Women in Colombia and Mexico Chapter Three Therapeutic Rationale of Plants Used to Treat Dental Infections Chapter Four Folk Anticancer Plants Containing Antitumor Compounds Chapter Five Informant Consensus: A New Approach for Identifying Potentially Effective Medicinal Plants Chapter Six Aztec Medicinal Herbs: Evaluation of Therapeutic Effectiveness PART THREE PLANTS IN MEDICINAL AND DIETARY CONTEXTS Editor's Introduction to Part Three Chapter Seven Empirical Investigations of Dietary Plants Used in Igbo Ethnomedicine Chapter Eight Dietary and Therapeutic Uses of Fruit in Three Taita Communities Chapter Nine Chinese Diet and Traditional Materia Medica: Effects on Platelet Function and Atherogenesis Chapter Ten Medicinal Plants of the New Guinea Highlands: An Ethnopharmacologic and Phytochemical Update Chapter Eleven Favism and Malaria: A Model of Nutrition and Biocultural Evolution Chapter Twelve Coumarin-Containing Plants and Serum Albumin Polymorphisms: Biomedical Implications for Native Americans of the Southwest Chapter Thirteen High Blood Pressure Medicinal Plant Use and Arterial Pressure Change Chapter Fourteen Chemical Selection in Andean Domesticated Tubers as a Model for the Acquisition of Empirical Plant Knowledge PART FOUR MEDICAL PANACEAS AND MISUNDERSTOOD PLANTS Editor's Introduction to Part Four Chapter Fifteen Ginseng: A Medical Enigma Chapter Sixteen Beyond the Mystique of Cocaine: Coca in Andean Cultural Perspective Index Abstract: This reference work aims to promote the biobehavioral focus for indigenous plant research by reviewing multidisciplinary perspectives in the evaluation of plants used in ethnomedicine and diet. Discussions include: biological and cultural parameters to illustrate the dynamics of plant selection and use in a variety of contexts; implications of such behaviors on human health; and highlights special cases of plants which, regardless of their contemporary notoriety, are better understood through objective review of the available data and sensitivity to cultural and ecological dimensions of human-plant interactions Investigations of medicinal and dietary plants play an important role in elucidating the dynamic interrelationships between the quality of human health and features of the physical and sociocultural environment.