Plants Used as Analgesics by Amazonian Caboclos as a Basis for Selecting Plants for Investigation

Abstract

Currently available analgesics still present enough undesirable effects that the search for new ones is justified. The traditional medical system plays an important role in health maintenance among Amazonian caboclo communities. Based on the premise that plant species used as remedies in this and other traditional medical systems can be regarded as potential sources of such new therapeutic compounds, an ethnopharmacological analysis of species used by caboclos as analgesics was made. In order to select species with higher likelihood to contain compounds with cross-cultural effectiveness, the study includes analysis of the uses of these species in other traditional systems.