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Grandma’s herbal remedies have been the foundation of our national
health care system for countless generations particularly in those
rural areas that are not well served with the formal health care
usually provided by governments. But grandma’s herbal remedies have
a longer tradition of service and have played a far more significant
role in our health care system than as a mere alternative to mainstream
medicine.

Grandma’s herbal remedies are as old as the proverbial Garden of Eden
for they are based on the natural therapeutic values inherent in plant
and animal life. An important aspect of grandma’s herbal remedies is
that they are based on the results of trial and error tests conducted
from virtually the birth of Man to this day using human sujects and
authenticated not by laboratories and scientific tests but by the living
proof of man’s survival since time began.Think about it!

This is admittedly a gross generalization but what is beyond doubt is
the importance and relevance of herbal medicine to our survival – the
foundation of grandma’s herbal remedies – to our health care system, to
our more healthy lifestyles and to our physical and emotional well-being.
In fact herbal medicine has never been more popular than it is today.
Herbal medicines improve the functions of the body permitting the body
to strengthen its own systems for growth and curing while at the same
time treating the underlying causes of negative conditions.

Herbalists treat the whole person and not just the symptoms. Thus two
persons could visit the same herbalist with apparently the identical
ailment yet receive two totally different prescriptions. The evidence
indicates that more and more people are turning to herbal medicine as
a kinder alternative to mainstream medicine with its reliance on
increasingly expensive pharmaceutical products.

Herbs have been the main tools in treating various forms of illness and
improving the health of all civilizations. The ancient Greek theories of
health and illness have been the basis of medieval medical science and the
foundation of current medical knowledge. Healers the world over have
learned the use of plants that exist in their immediate environment in
order to heal a range of illnesses and injuries. Indeed such medicines
serve as a public health safety net in many developing countries.

Grandma’s herbal remedies are much more than the result of an intuitive
knowledge of what plants to use to treat the symptoms of particular
illnesses or to provide a cure for a recurrent ailment. My own grandmother
it is true used a handful of a spider’s web to staunch the flow of blood
from a particularly bad wound and to ensure that it healed properly. Teas
from carefully selected plants were used for ailments ranging from the
common cold to high fevers; and the leaf of the aloe plant treated severe
burns without leaving disfiguring scars.

Today however the use of herbal medicine, including grandma’s herbal
remedies, has incorporated a scientific approach that combines the ancient
philosophical concepts that are at the foundation of its development with
the holistic approach of western physiology. Herbal medicine is therefore
much more than replacing pharmaceutical medicine with natural medicine. It
is in fact a deep philosophy of healing as ancient as the human race and
as modern as clinical studies today.

There is therefore a qualitative difference between the philosophical
approach to herbal medicine and grandma’s herbal remedies both of which
use herbs as alternative medical treatments. There should always be a place
in our health care system for grandma’s herbal remedies. I hope so. However,
as modern scientific and technological advances continue to dominate our
daily lives, grandma’s herbal remedies may soon become a mere footnote in the
records of our health care system.

The author, Rudy Collins, is a retired government functionary who has
developed an interest in medical concepts relating to longevity and anti-aging.
He hosts an information based website on folk medicine and related interventions at:

www.folkmedicineblog.com

and regularly contributes articles on various aspects of folk and herbal
medicine.