Customer Reviews

Medicinal Plants of the World: Chemical Constituents, Traditional and Modern Medicinal Uses (Medicinal Plants of the World (Humana))

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As someone working actively in the field of phytotherapies, I was extremely disappointed when this bbok landed on my desk by our research library - a waste of budget to say the least. The depth of each plant reviewed is on the whole well done, however, Europe as a land mass let alone a group of exciting people, does not appear to exist for this FDA author. The introductory preface clearly identifies that the author is not in tune with real global herbal medicine. Only 27 plants are reviewed, and the choice is bizzare and incoherent. Don't bother with it - there are far better books available!

I have been using the two books by I.A. Ross in the library, and hopefully will buy my own copies soon. The organization of information is excellent. There is a similarly titled book by van Wyk and Michael Wink, which I bought sometime ago before I discovered the books by Ross. The book by Wyk and Wink, with its misleading title,is quite inferior to the books by Ivan Ross. My main grouse with the Wyk and Wink book was its over-representation of European plants, considering the relative small size of Europe and the small number of people there who rely on herbal medicines, compared to the hundreds of millions of people who depend on medicinal plants in Africa, Asia and South America. In any case, most of the "medicinal plants of the world" are in those continents. The second reviewer should be quite pleased with th book by Wyk and Wink, with its near-equation of "world" with Europe-North America. One distinguishing feature of these excellent books by Ross is its information on the traditional medicinal preparations of these plants. This is information you rarely come across in the so-called Encyclopedias of Herbs published to profit from what the publishers obviously treat as a fad. The choice of plants by Ivan Ross is quite consistent because they are mostly plants used by millions for whom herbal therapy is not just 'alternative therapy'. The scientific information collected in these books make these books invaluable reference books for a wide range of professionals

As a layperson interested in the value of medicinal plants, I found this book very interesting. Even though it is primarily a book geared toward the scientific community, I found the traditional uses and pharmacological activities interesting enough to cause me to research these plants further. I like the fact that many of the plants discussed are common food plants and I was not aware of the medicinal values of them. I would recommend that anyone, either scientist or layperson, interested in furthering their knowledge in this area purchase this book. I would think that any scientist interested in this field would certainly want this book as an addition to their reference library.