Product Description

The Green Pharmacy

Many diseases and conditions for which we turn to modern medicine can also be treated naturally with healing herbs, medicinal food, other natural remedies--and these treatments can be safer, less expensive and possibly even more effective than traditional methods. Let Dr. James Duke, the world's leading authority on healing herbs, lead you through the vast world of natural remedies--from Anise for Asthma to Violet for Varicose Veins, and everything in between. With just a few trips to the health-food store, the supermarket, or your own backyard--and with the help of Dr. Duke--you'll have everything you need to create your own Natural Medicine Cabinet.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #61624 in Books
• Published on: 1999-07-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 528 pages

Amazon.com Review
There's still a lot to learn about the healing power of plants, James Duke points out, but what we do know is already prodigious. Much of that knowledge is gathered in The Green Pharmacy, an A-to-Z guide to that relies on plant-based medicines to cure what ails us. Between the listings, Duke crams personal anecdotes from a lifetime of studying herbs, berries, and bark. For example, he relates how he worried about telling a pregnant niece that ginger could help alleviate her morning sickness because he'd learned from a pharmacologist that ginger could also induce miscarriage. Then he solved the mystery: he'd recommended ginger tea, which contains about 250 milligrams of ginger. The Chinese, he learned, use about 80 times that much to end pregnancies--another testimony to the amazing versatility of these natural medicines.

From Library Journal
Very readable and fun, The Green Pharmacy is the culmination of the author's 30 years of studying and using herbs. In an interesting mix of folklore and science, Duke, a botanist and authority on healing herbs, describes treatment protocols for over 120 health conditions. Although there is frequent reference to experts and studies, including up-to-date findings from the German Commission E monographs, no accurate references or bibliography are provided. Nonetheless, based on the author's credentials, this is recommended for larger collections.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"The Green Pharmacy is full of helpful, practical information about using plants as medicines . . . I plan to consult it often."--Dr. Andrew Weil

"The Green Pharmacy is a tour de force by the world's leading authority on the herbal healing traditions . . . a treasure house of practical advice for the newcomer and pearls of wisdom for the herbal practitioner."--Joseph E. Pizzorno, N.D., President of Bastyr University, Seattle, and author of Total Wellness

"If you are bewildered by all the books that have been published on herbal healing, this is the one to buy!"--Mark J. Plotkin, Ph.D., ethnobotanist and author of Tales of a Sharman's Apprentice

"Filled with gems of wisdom--a treasure of information from a man who knows a smuch as anyone in the world about medicinal plants."--Jean Carper, bestselling author of Miracle Cures
-- Review

Customer Reviews

A no-nonsense,nearly perfect handbook for a popular audience
Since I began making and using herbal remedies in 1980 I have been very concerned at the lack of reliable information. Pop and self-help books on herbalism suffer from excessive vagueness (if they are conservative and the author is trying hard to avoid lawsuits) or irresponsible promulgation of superstition (if the author is clumsy, credulous, or ignorant). On the other hand, publications dealing with formal studies of bioactive compounds of plants tend to be inaccessible to the public. There have been very few books that I (as a Ph.D. student in botany as well as a bit of an herbalist) feel comfortable in recommending. This one is at the top of the list.

Nobody can beat James Duke at comfortable pop-level communication combined with solid, informed good judgement. In this book he gives practical preparation and dosage suggestions -- something the too-careful books don't do. He also provides clear, definite cautions on drug interactions and side-effects.

My only criticism of Duke's book is that he may be a bit too confident when he suggests combining several herbs at once to treat some conditions. Folklore and formal studies may provide reasonable dosage guides for individual herbs. But no single folklore or ancient system encompasses, at once, medicinal plants of South America, China, and Europe. Combining herbs that have not been traditonally used, nor clinically tested, in such combination, is not something I would advise to a general audience.

Nevertheless I rate this book very highly. I don't know how many copies of the previous edition I bought to give to people: teenagers, undergraduate college students, my old hippy friends, my father, doctors, and various people who ask me about medical botany.

We all owe Duke a great deal for his tremendous work and his true desire to help others. EVERYONE, without exception, who is interested in medical botany from a practical standpoint, should have this book.

Informative for use of FRESH herbs
This is a very informative book, but it did not give me the answers I was looking for. The recipies for health given in the book rely mostly on the use of fresh herbs. I'm not an accomplished gardener nor do I have access to the varities of herbs mentioned here. I was looking for a book that gives dosages of dried herb in pill form, as you find in drugstores. This type of information is not found here. It is an excellent book for letting you know what type of herb to use for an ailment, but does not give much information on how much to take, how many times a day, and so forth. As I know that just because a remedy is herbal it does not always mean that it is safe, I feel I require more dosage information before experimenting.

the best of its kind
There are a lot of books similar to this one, with alphabetically arranged diseases and symptoms for sections, followed by passages on the kinds of herbs that might be helpful, and why. Of all the ones I've seen, this one is my favorite. Duke has a very engaging writing style, and the book is well suited for browsing or reading cover to cover. He seems appropriately cautious in some of the suggestions he makes, but I agree with other reviewers concerns that this is not always the case. I cannot speak from the perspective of an MD or an herbalist, because I am neither of those. Speaking for myself, I wouldn't try a lot of the potential remedies presented in this book, and I disagree with some of the suggestions contained in it. Nevertheless, there is plenty of information that I did agree with and overall I'd say this book is wonderful to read and learn from. Duke's experience and authority on the subject matter is very impressive, and that is reflected very well in this book.