National Geographic Guide to Medicinal Herbs ─ The World's Most Effective Healing Plants

"Because I have long worked to make accurate information on botanical remedies available to consumers as well as to doctors, pharmacists, and allied health professionals, I am delighted to see the appearance of the National Geographic Guide to Medicinal Herbs. This excellent guide is the work of a team of highly qualified botanical and medical experts, including two of my colleagues from the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine. It offers reliable, up-to-date, practical information about 72 of the most important medicinal herbs." --Andrew Weil, M.D., from the Foreword

There is a world of health and healing all around you--in your spice rack, your backyard, and on the shelves of health food and grocery stores. This informative guide is a reference you will keep at the ready, connecting 72 of the world's most common and useful medicinal herbs with the body systems they help and heal.

Eight chapters focus on body systems:
1. Mental Health & the Nervous System
2. Respiratory System
3. Heart & Circulation
4. Digestive System
5. Joints, Muscles & Skin
6. Urinary & Male Health
7. Female Health
8. Wellness & Perception

Each chapter begins with an overview of how plants can bring health to that part of the body, with stories about traditional herbal remedies from around the world and current scientific findings on herbal remedies for specific illnesses. Then each chapter highlights nine plants, combining botanical and medical information--therapeutic uses, effectiveness, preparations, cautions, and advice, including a round-up of current science about the active ingredients in the plant. Every chapter includes a photo gallery showing how one of its herbs is cultivated and processed commercially--the story behind the contents of that bottle you buy in the store. Special features include "Over the Kitchen Counter"--quick and easy ways to use herbs in your everyday life, and time lines for every herb, showing how today's use of herbal remedies collects wisdom from the centuries and around the world. A functional appendix includes an illustrated index to all the plants in the book, an ailment-by-ailment therapeutic index, a glossary, and an index.

TIERAONA LOW DOG, M.D. is a recognized media expert in integrative medicine--combining traditional and world healing methods with sciencebased Western medicine--and a practicing physician with a background as herbalist and midwife. Low Dog addresses thousands of people each year. She was appointed by Pres. Clinton to the White House Commission of Complementary and Alternative Medicine and served for 10 years as chair of the U.S. Pharmacopeia Dietary Supplements and Botanicals Expert Committee. She maintains a clinical practice and teaches on the faculty of Andrew Weil's Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona. She received the Martina de la Cruz medal for work with indigenous medicines in 1998; Time magazine identified her as the 2001 "Innovator in Complementary and Alternative Medicine." She maintains a website: drlowdog.com.