Herbal Therapies and Social-Health Policies: Indigenous Ati Negrito Women’s Dilemma and Reproductive Healthcare Transitions in the Philippines

Abstract

The high maternal mortality in the Philippines in the past decades prompted intervention strategies to curb unwanted deaths of mothers and improve health and social conditions of women. Such introductions however have begun to challenge traditional reproductive health practices creating confusion among practitioners and incipient transitions in healthcare. Our aim in this study was to document the herbal therapies practiced by indigenous Ati Negrito women and discuss the implications of social and conventional healthcare intervention programs on reproductive healthcare traditions by conducting semistructured interviews. Fidelity Level index was used to determine culturally important plants (i.e., the most preferred). Review of related studies on most preferred plants and therapies was further carried out to provide information regarding their safety/efficacy (or otherwise). Determination of informants' traditional medicinal knowledge was done using Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis tests. A total of 49 medicinal plants used in treating female reproductive health-related syndromes across four categories were recorded. Significant differences in traditional medicinal knowledge were recorded when informants were grouped according to age, education, and number of children. Issues discussed in this research could hopefully raise awareness on changes in healthcare practices in indigenous cultures and on medical safety especially when traditional and conventional medications interact.

Plants used during maternity, menstrual cycle and other women's health conditions among Brazilian cultures

“…Studies about this theme in other countries target some specific cultures (Adnan et al 2015;Bourdy and Walter, 1992;Lamxay et al 2011;Michel et al, 2012;Ong and Kim, 2015;Razafindraibe et al, 2013;Shah et al, 2013;Srithi et al, 2012;van der Kooi and Theobald, 2006), or specific conditions (Malan and Neuba, 2011;Telefo et al 2012), which permits a better definition of held practices, whether ritualistic (Lamxay et al 2011), plantation and collection (Shah et al, 2013), which might facilitate the understanding of how certain traditional remedies act in the context that their use is inserted. However, the reviewed studies (de Boer and Cotingting, 2014;Njamen et al, 2013;Torri, 2013) (Chang and But, 1986) and India (Kapoor, 1990) are based on natural products, and they have been part of the official medicine in those coutries for …”

“…International reviews show a low number of articles focusing on the use of plants for women's health conditions through folk medicine and most of the studies published were from Asia (Adnan et al, 2015;de Boer and Lamxay, 2009;Lamxay et al, 2011;Liulan et al, 2003;Ong and Kim, 2015;Shah et al, 2013;Srithi et al, 2012), Africa (Malan and Neuba, 2011;Razafindraibe et al, 2013;Telefo et al, 2011;van der Kooi and Theobald, 2006) and Oceania (Bourdy and Walter, 1992). Few studies were performed in the Americas (Bussmann and Glenn, 2010;Michel et al, 2012;Torri, 2013) and, despite its endemic richness and cultural diversity, no data was found regarding this specific topic in Brazil.…”

Utilization of Plants in Postpartum Maternal Care in Watulea Village, Central Buton Regency

“…Tradisi budaya perawatan kesehatan di kalangan wanita selama kehamilan, kelahiran, pasca persalinan, dan periode neonatal merupakan hal yang umum di Asia Tenggara (Ong & Kim, 2015;de Boer & Lamxay, 2009), tak terkecuali di Indonesia. Pemanfaatan tumbuhan dalam perawatan bagi ibu setelah melahirkan telah dilaporkan dari beberapa penelitian seperti pada suku Aceh di Kabupaten Pidie (Zumaidar et al, 2019), Kampar Kiri Hulu, Riau (Susandarini et al, 2021), dan Enggano (Royyani et al, 2018).…”

Ethnobotanical Documentation of Medicinal Plants Used by the Indigenous Panay Bukidnon in Lambunao, Iloilo, Philippines

“…Several ethnobotanical surveys in Panay Island have been conducted on the Ati (Negritoes) indigenous groups (Madulid et al, 1989;Ong and Kim, 2015;Cordero et al, 2020;Cordero and Alejandro, 2021), but there is no study focused exhaustively on the medicinal plants used by the Panay Bukidnon in ethnomedicine. Nevertheless, several plants were listed with medicinal purposes in the anthropological case studies documented in the interior barangays of Tapaz, Capiz in Central Panay in [1945][1946][1947][1948][1949][1950][1951][1952][1953][1954][1955][1956][1957][1958][1959] (Jocano, 1968).…”