No abstract

A large proportion of the general public has come to rely on these simple measures for part of their primary healthcare. In developing countries access to medicine is scarce and expensive forcing the majority to depend on natural remedies which have been handed down through generations. However even in developed societies skepticism towards medicine is on the rise and more and more people are favoring herbal home remedies believing they are free of undesirable side effects [1]. In fact, about 8% of hospital admissions in the United States of America are due to adverse or side effects of synthetic drugs.In Germany a public opinion poll showed that 50% of the population uses herbal remedies, and one study indicated that patients want to be informed on the use of home remedies by their primary physicians as well [2,3]. A cross-national study across 14 European countries on self-care for common colds revealed that participants used 9 times more non-pharmaceutical items than pharmaceutical items [4].