A survey on traditional plants used in Al Khobah village

Abstract

The use of traditional medicine for treatment of various diseases is a common practise in most of the developing countries including the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia especially in rural areas. In this survey, Al Khobah village was selected to study the status of Traditional Medicine. Al Khobah village is located on the Southern boarders of the kingdom and characterized by diverse topography and moderate weather. The plants with medicinal uses were collected, identified and their methods of preparation and uses were recorded. After gathering all these information from the local people, literature survey was conducted on each plant to get information about pharmacological activities and weather they support the traditional use or not. The survey revealed that the uses of some plants are consistent with the experimental data in the literature. Some other plants were studied; however, they still need pharmacological investigation to prove the claimed uses. Other plant did not subject to any scientific investigation.

Ethnobotanical Study of Indigenous Medicinal Plants of Jazan Region, Saudi Arabia

“…All these families as well as other families cited in the present study are described in Saudi Arabia flora [50, 52]. The therapeutic virtues of some plant species belonging to these families were also reported while their bioactive compounds and mode of action have not yet been defined accurately and need further studies [10]. Still, most of these species are not traded in local markets in Saudi Arabia.…”

“…In adjacent regions with similar climate and biodiversity as Al-Baha, different species such as J. procera, Z. spina-christi, and Rumex nervosus were the most common [4]. However Commiphora myrrha was considered to be the most popular MPs used traditionally by most of the Saudi population, which is not the case in our study area [10, 68].…”

“…Still the transmission and conservation of TK are more evident in the mountain villages due to the high plant biodiversity and the modesty of public health facilities compared to the big cities. Furthermore, these modern health facilities found presently in the mountain villages were built only recently and they are generally providing care for simple conditions [10]. Therefore peoples from the mountain villages have to travel about 100 km to find a modern hospital which is mostly in Jazan city, Abu-Arish, and Sabya (Tihama coastal plains).…”

“…Despite the good public health facilities existing in the mountain villages, peoples have to travel in some cases about 100 km to find a modern hospital with well-trained medical staff which is mostly in Jazan city, Abu-Arish, and Sabya (Tihama coastal plains). Moreover in several rural areas modern health facilities were only built recently and they generally provide care for simple conditions [10]. Therefore, we compared the knowledge of MPs between the two collection regions and between four age brackets (35–45, 46-55, 56-65, and above 65 years of age).…”

“…Therefore, scientific ethnobotanical studies have to be undertaken on the largest scale possible as recommended by the WHO [57] to preserve this fast vanishing knowledge. In Saudi Arabia, most of the studies on herbal medicines were partial and fragmentary [4, 7, 10, 21, 23]. Still, very little are the documents that detailed the folk medicine in southwestern regions of the country.…”