Fundamentals of Pharmacognosy and Phytotherapy

PART A Fundamentals of Pharmacognosy

SECTION 1 Pharmacognosy and Phytotherapy

1 Importance of Plants in Modern Pharmacy and Medicine

2 Pharmacognosy and Its History: People, Plants and Natural Products

SECTION 2 Medicinal Plant Sciences

3 General Principles of Botany: Morphology and Systematics

4 Plant Families Yielding Important Medicines

5 Ethnobotany and Ethnopharmacology

SECTION 3 Natural Products: An Introduction

6 Natural Product Chemistry

7 Analytical Methods for Natural Products

8 Natural Product Isolation and Structure Elucidation

9 Natural Products With Anticancer and Chemopreventive Effects

10 Antimicrobial Natural Products

SECTION 4 Herbal Medicinal Products

11 The Complex Pharmacology of Herbal Medicines

12 Production, Quality Control and Standardisation of Herbal Medicines

13 Toxicity of Herbal Constituents

14 Herbal Medicine Interactions

15 Regulation and Pharmacovigilance for Herbal Medicines

16 Plants in Traditional Medicine Systems

17 Complementary, Alternative and Integrative Plant Therapies

PART B Important Plant Medicines

18 The Gastrointestinal and Biliary System

19 The Cardiovascular System

20 Weight-Loss Supplements

21 The Respiratory System

22 The Central Nervous System

23 The Musculoskeletal System

24 Female Hormonal and Reproductive Conditions

25 The Male Reproductive System

26 Supportive Therapies for Stress, Ageing, Cancer and Debility

27 Topical Phytotherapy: Skin, Hair, Eye, Ear, Nose and Throat

ANNEX

Naming Herbal Drugs: Pharmaceutical (Latinised), Common English and Accepted Botanical Names (Binomials) and Synonyms 

Index

Pharmacognosy, the science of nature-derived drugs, pharmaceuticals, and poisons, played a crucial role in the development of modern medicine, and now has an equally important place in healthcare all over the world. This wide scope ranges from traditional medicine systems and herbal and nutritional therapies, the preparation and use of highly standardised and clinically tested herbal medicines, to the production of potent drugs used only in a purified form. Natural sources mainly focus on plants, fungi and algae, but drug discovery of novel compounds and structures includes bacteria and even marine animals.

Fundamentals of Pharmacognosy and Phytotherapy is a landmark textbook that covers this spectrum of medicinal plant use. Written by leading experts in this field, this book takes the reader through the history, identification, and quality assurance of plant-based medicines to their therapeutic properties, safety, and compatibility and interaction with prescribed drugs.

Aimed at students of all healthcare professions, including pharmacy, medicine, nursing and complementary therapies, the comprehensively updated information in this textbook is also relevant to those companies and organisations concerned with the regulation and testing of herbal medicines (phytomedicines), other natural health products, nutraceuticals and dietary supplements.

• Introduces the concepts and scope of pharmacognosy
• Examines the scientific evidence of plant-based medicines for a range of health conditions
• Extended and updated referencing includes recent reviews, WHO and official documents (open access where available) for quick access to further scientific literature

• Antimicrobial natural products: as antibiotics and antiseptics, and their potential as bacterial resistance modifiers
• Anticancer natural products: scope now includes their role in chemoprevention and associated anti-inflammatory mechanisms
• New chapter on pharmacovigilance for herbal medicines and related products
• Quality assurance and pharmacopoeial methods extended, with many new figures and examples
• Plant medicines of recent scientific interest (popularity, or notoriety) added throughout

An enhanced eBook version is included with purchase. The eBook allows you to access all the text, figures, and references, with the ability to search, customise your content, make notes and highlights, and have content read aloud.

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