Book Review: Modern Oriental Phytotherapy in Sexul Medicine

Herbal medicine, a natural therapeutic method using medical plants, is greatly differentiated from the pharmacological treatment for which various substance are made into drugs. Herbal phytotherapy is a natural therapy to prevent or treat diseases by analyzing the medical actions of certain plants and using the ingredients excellent in medical effect. Regardless of east or west, the herbal medicine has been used to keep health and cure diseases for a very long time through traditional and classical principles on life and environment. Such natural treatment began with the history of mankind. In sexual medicine, many clinicians have got increasingly more curious about the natural treatment of sexual dysfunction using medicinal herbs or extracted natural substances, and there has been an increase in clinical demand using herbs, like other medical fields. Currently, there are a limited number of drugs whose effects are determined by scientific verification among those extracted from medicinal herbs. The herbs known to be effective for sexual improvement or erectile dysfunction treatment are ginseng, onion, garlic, Cornelian cherry, Acanthopanax senticosus, black raspberries, Epimedium koreanum, Pleuropterus multiflorus, Polygonatum, Aconitum carmichaeli, etc. They are used for traditional herb medicine as extracts, herb teas, or topical gents, and for modern western medicine that ties to produce drugs by separating active ingredients within natural substances or synthesizing active ingredients chemically. Many natural substances used for treatment by natives in Asia, Africa, or America have become major ideas for the development processes, such as separation of active ingredients from natural substances, animal study, research in vitro and clinical experiment play roles of infinite ideas for bioscience, lay groundwork for the fusion between western and oriental medicines, and provide clinical doctors with a wider variety of remedies.

The publication of this book was supported by the Asia Pacific Society for Sexual Medicine budget from 2009 International Society for Sexual Medicine.

This book is composed of part I: the current situation and the clinical experience in sexual medicine with the oriental herbs of Asia-Pacific countries; part II: the commercially available medicinal herb products in Asia-Pacific countries; and part III: the atlas of medicinal herb. It is expected the "Modern Oriental Phytotherapy in Sexual Medicine" will be a touchstone for the study of herb medicines in the field of sexual medicine by settling the questions of sexual medicine researchers or doctors about oriental herbs, and will help sexual medical scientists select and use herb medicines by introducing the drugs on the market.