An Overview of Information Resources for Herbal Medicinals and Dietary Supplements

Abstract

The dramatic increase in the use of complementary and alternative medicine therapies over the past decade has led to a proliferation of resources for information on herbal medicinals and dietary supplements. During this same time period the World Wide Web was created, and we now have to contend with yet another method of information dissemination. More than ever, clinical practitioners need to be able to differentiate between biased or unscientific information and reliable, evidence-based information. In this overview, we provide a comprehensive, annotated listing of reliable resources of information on herbs and dietary supplements divided into the following categories: journals, databases and Web sites, and books and compendia.