Herbal Formularies for Health Professionals, Volume 1

Book excerpt: Herbal Formularies for Health Professionals is a five-volume set that serves as a comprehensive, practical reference manual for herbalists, physicians, nurses, and allied health professionals. Dr. Jill Stansbury draws on her decades of clinical experience and her extensive research to provide an unparalleled range of herbal formulas. Organized by body system, each volume includes hundreds of formulas to treat common health conditions, as well as formulas that address specific energetic or symptomatic presentations, including Dr. Stansbury's own formulas, formulas from herbal folklore, and formulas from Traditional Chinese Medicine. For each formula, Dr. Stansbury offers a brief explanation of how the selected herbs address the specific condition. The book offers many sidebars and user-friendly lists--helping readers quickly choose which herbs are best for specific presentations--and details traditional uses of both western herbs and traditional Asian herbs and formulas that are readily available in the United States. Volume 1 focuses on digestive health and the emunctories, an herbal term referring to the organs of elimination: the gastrointestinal system, the urinary system, and the skin. This volume offers formulas and supporting information for treating gastrointestinal and biliary conditions, liver and gallbladder conditions, renal and urinary conditions, and dermatologic conditions. Each chapter includes a materia medica section that describes individual herbs with tips on their properties, modes of action, and the specific symptoms each plant best addresses. Each chapter includes a materia medica section that describes individual herbs with tips on their properties, modes of action, and the specific symptoms each plant best addresses. These formularies are also a tutorial for budding herbalists on the sophisticated art of fine-tuning the precision of an herbal formula for the constitution and overall health condition of an individual patient, rather than a basic diagnosis. The text aims to teach via example, helping clinicians develop their own intuition and ability to create effective herbal formulas. Volume 2 (Circulation and Respiration) is also available, and Volume 3 (Endocrinology) will be published in May 2019. Volumes 4 (Neurology, Pyschiatry, and Pain Management) and 5 (Immunology, Orthopedics, and Otolarnygology) will be published in 2020.