Levantamento etnobotânico das plantas medicinais comercializadas por raizeiros no município de Esperança – PB e comparação com dados da literatura.

Abstract

Brazil is characterized as a country of great diversity, owning about 20% of the world's flora, enabling a rich diversity of medicinal plants which often represent the only therapeutic resource in many communities, and thus, people all over the world, maintains the practice of homemad phytotherapy, making valid therapeutic information that has been accumulated for centuries. This work aimed to make the ethnobotanical survey of medicinal plants commercialized by healers in the town of Esperança-PB, with the aim to preserve the folk knowledge of the use thereof. A comparison between information provided by merchants with that described in the literature for those cited medicinal species, was performed thus contributing to the validation of traditional knowledge. The study was conducted at the street fair of Esperança, after approval by the Research Ethics Committee, protocol 12129713.4.0000.5182. The approach used was a semi-structured questionnaire administered to seven salespeople, that it was established that their knowledge relating to medicinal plants was acquired through relatives, passed from generation to generation. The search resulted in a total of 32 species, grouped into 23 botanical families, highlighting the Lamiaceae family as the most representative. The parts most commonly used for the preparation of home remedies were the leaves and seeds. How to predominant use, stood teas obtained by the methods of decoction and infusion. Among the species mentioned, the instructions use was predominated for the treatment of inflammation and pain, in general. After comparing the data obtained by the healers about medicinal plants with those in the literature, it was found that 81,25% of the information on the form of preparation, 84,37% on the part of the plant used and 75,00% of the data on therapeutic indications, presented agreement, demonstrating a great knowledge of the respondents about medicinal plants. However, in some cases this knowledge was far from that reported scientifically demonstrating the gaps that conventional wisdom and scientific possess. Observed the commercialization of plants with high toxic potential, such as the oleander and the potential risk of extinction, such as mastic, sucupira and quixaba, demonstrating the need for salespeople to know better the species with which it works and awareness regarding best practices for preserving and storing medicinal plants. The ethnobotanical studies are of great value for contributing knowledge and the preservation of local culture. The popular wisdom, despite its limitations, is useful and should be used by those that build knowledge within the scientific method. However, it is important to inform yourself better about the species that are used by the community, because the lack of scientific knowledge by the healers about the toxic properties of some medicinal plants can result in serious risks to human health.