Review on the indigenous use and ethnopharmacology of hot and cold natures of phytomedicines in the Iranian traditional medicine

ABSTRACT

Objective: According to our best knowledge, this is the first and also a relatively comprehensive review on the cold and hot (or warm) nature of common Iranian traditional herbal medicines, based on the evidence-based and directly collected from the user and native-healers, instead of reviewing the classical texts of Iranian traditional medicine. This column resulted from a wide field study on the common Iranian traditional herbal medicine for their so-called effects of cold, hot and also balanced natures, used currently among ethno-pharmacologists, herbal-drug sellers and rural native-healers. Methods: The junior medical students were grouped into several groups for data collection. The information gathered from ethno-pharmacologists, herbal-drug sellers and rural native-healers, from different regions of Iran, especially Northwest, Southwest, Central and Northern provinces. For each repeated report of a certain indication, we added “a point” to the specification of that plant. If the number of every reported indication was, more than 5-20 times we reported that indication or pharmacological effect in our final report in this article.Results:The data recorded for every plant included: scientific name, family names, English name, Persian name, therapeutic nature (cold, hot or balanced), suggested actions and pharmacology, indication and usage, used parts/preparation, mode of administration. The plants were grouped into 25 families. Of a total 61 plants 16 were with cold (26%) and 43 were with hot nature (70%) and the rest were with balanced nature (4%). Conclusions: Almost of them have been long used as the components of the ancient receipts, hence, they may be more readily tried as suitable candidates in the future modern pharmacological investigations. Nevertheless, almost of them have been already evaluated in pharmacological laboratories, and their efficient properties have been confirmed. Considering the pharmacological properties of these plants, for finding a clear correlation of the pharmacological activities with the hot or cold nature, more detailed studies need to be conducted. Here we presented 61 plants currently used in Iranian traditional herbal medicine.