Rating: 
Summary: Pdr has produced a benchmark!
Review: Haven previosuly used herbal medicines, and being an inqusitive person by nature, I simply had to examine this reference work, i.e., PDR for Herbal Medicines (1st Ed). What Pdr has accomplished is no small feat. They have taken the most used and common herbal medecines and put them all in one vollume. Want to find out about St. Johns Wort and its effects and side effects. Then this source is the right answer and it will supply the answer. The picture section all the herbs is a nice addition and the latin names for these herbs is a bonus. Highly Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: PDR for Herbal Medicines
Review: I just received this book. I'm a family physician and I get lot of questions about herbal products. This is the most comprehensive and up-to-date reference source on herbal medicines. I found infromation on new interactions between St. John Wort and cyclosporine, AIDS drugs, and others. I would strongly recommend other physicians to get this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Practical Guide to Natural Medicines is better!
Review: I'm a former practicing pharmacist, now a health promotion educator who must, for my lectures, keep up to date on the rapidly emerging information (peer reviewed research & commercial publications, internet, etc.) about medicinals, vitamins, minerals, supplements, herbs, natural remedies, etc. available to public with and without a prescription. My goal is to ferret out fact from fiction. I believe THE AMERICAN PHARMACEUTICAL ASSOCIATION PRACTICAL GUIDE TO NATURAL MEDICINES is a MUCH BETTER (a FIVE star) resource--especially since it's a 1999 publication that cites sources including German monographs that are basis of PDR. The description of APA Guide, on Amazon.com, does not do this book justice. Once I got PRACTICAL GUIDE TO NATURAL MEDICINES I no longer used PDR.
Rating: 
Summary: Alfalfa and Buckwheat
Review: I'm glad that someone put together an herbal PDR... I just wish they had done a decent job. This looks like it was written by The Little Rascals (Alfalfa and Buckwheat). First of all, the latin names are wrong throughout the book. No author of the name is ever given, the capitalization does not follow convention, and no effort is made to use the currently official names. This makes it difficult or even impossible to know exactly which species is being discussed, in some cases. And it makes it seem that the people who wrote it don't know what they're talking about. It is also interesting to note that the literature reviews which went into making this were not very comprehensive; the book will often say that no data exists when a simple Medline search will prove otherwise. Perhaps for the next edition, "Our Gang" should hire a botanist to help them do the latin names properly, and a medical librarian to help with finding and citing literature.
Rating:
Summary: PDR for Herbal Medicines
Review: The PDR for Herbal Medicines is a useful reference, but is not strong enough to stand on it's own. It's one more book that should be included in a large library of herbal reviews and research.
Rating:
Summary: An essential medical reference.
Review: The second edition of the PDR for Herbal Medicines has been fully revised and updated, providing and latest scientific data in a concise herbal reference. New information and studies are aimed at practicing physicians and monographs have been updated to include the latest scientific findings and clinical trails, case reports and analysis reports. An essential medical reference.
Rating:
Summary: Best Herbal Reference
Review: This is the most complete reference for herbal medicines that I have seen.It contains many common names as well as Latin names. Being a Certified Pharmacy Technician for 15 years this is a must have. There are probably 100 questions a month on what the side effects and interactions are of various herbal medicines. It is an invaluable reference guide for all pharmacies!
Rating:
Summary: Pdr has produced a benchmark!
Review: This new edition of the PDR for Herbal Medicines goes beyond the first edition, published in December of 1998. While the first edition was somewhat limited by dated, unreferenced information, this one is much more up-to-date and includes recent references to the literature, such as the St. John's wort interactions with indinavir and cyclosporin that were just published this year. Each entry gives a botanical overview, describes actions and pharmacology, and discusses indications and usage in various medical traditions. There is information on clinical trials, and more material on herb/drug interaction, precautions, contraindications, adverse reactions, and dosage. Having a complete herbal reference is a necessity for physicians and other health-care providers in today's world - whether they want to include some herbals in their armamentarium or merely wish to head off possible herb-drug interactions among the patients who are treating themselves.A careful reading of the hypericum section, however, revealed that several newer clinical trials were not included, while an old (1994) study remained. In this reference, the physician would learn St. John's wort taken concomitantly with sertraline may lead to "serotonin syndrome," e.g., sweating, tremor, flushing, confusion and agitation. The likelihood of seeing this effect would be difficult to judge, however, since these anecdotal reports from the literature are taken a face value with little critical appraisal. If we don't know how many patients have taken this particular combination, we have no denominator. The inclusion of all material related to toxicologic effects is good for the sake of a comprehensive overview, but the drawback is to lose the feel for what may really be important. An example is the inclusion of a reference regarding hypericum toxicity when directly incubated with sperm or oocytes. Without pointing out that this very unusual study is not the way reproductive or teratogenic is determined during drug development, the reader may be left with the belief that hypericum showed reproductive toxicity. The reference to an interaction with theophylline might have mentioned that the patient was on a plethora of other drugs and relied on her recollection of events. It might also have mentioned that direct human studies of the 1A2 and 2D6 enzymes found no effect from hypericum. Rather, it stated that hypericum "...may significantly affect plasma concentrations of any drug that is metabolized by the cytochrome P-450 system." This is not supported by data. Also unsupported is the incorrect statement taken from Schultz et al's Rational Phytotherapy that phototoxicity may occur at hypericin plasma concentrations of 50 mcg/mL. This should have read 50 mcg/L (or 50 ng/mL) as the original paper reported. Also not useful is the daily dosage recommendation of 200 - 1000 mcg hypericin for depression; one might conclude that there is evidence for this. While this book is sold as a mainstream reference it may be somewhat daunting for the layman. It's well-organized style and the provision of recent scientific and medical references will make it a useful starting place for more in depth research for health-care professionals. Perhaps the publication of an erratum could be recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Better than the 1st Edition
Review: This new edition of the PDR for Herbal Medicines goes beyond the first edition, published in December of 1998. While the first edition was somewhat limited by dated, unreferenced information, this one is much more up-to-date and includes recent references to the literature, such as the St. John's wort interactions with indinavir and cyclosporin that were just published this year. Each entry gives a botanical overview, describes actions and pharmacology, and discusses indications and usage in various medical traditions. There is information on clinical trials, and more material on herb/drug interaction, precautions, contraindications, adverse reactions, and dosage. Having a complete herbal reference is a necessity for physicians and other health-care providers in today's world - whether they want to include some herbals in their armamentarium or merely wish to head off possible herb-drug interactions among the patients who are treating themselves. A careful reading of the hypericum section, however, revealed that several newer clinical trials were not included, while an old (1994) study remained. In this reference, the physician would learn St. John's wort taken concomitantly with sertraline may lead to "serotonin syndrome," e.g., sweating, tremor, flushing, confusion and agitation. The likelihood of seeing this effect would be difficult to judge, however, since these anecdotal reports from the literature are taken a face value with little critical appraisal. If we don't know how many patients have taken this particular combination, we have no denominator. The inclusion of all material related to toxicologic effects is good for the sake of a comprehensive overview, but the drawback is to lose the feel for what may really be important. An example is the inclusion of a reference regarding hypericum toxicity when directly incubated with sperm or oocytes. Without pointing out that this very unusual study is not the way reproductive or teratogenic is determined during drug development, the reader may be left with the belief that hypericum showed reproductive toxicity. The reference to an interaction with theophylline might have mentioned that the patient was on a plethora of other drugs and relied on her recollection of events. It might also have mentioned that direct human studies of the 1A2 and 2D6 enzymes found no effect from hypericum. Rather, it stated that hypericum "...may significantly affect plasma concentrations of any drug that is metabolized by the cytochrome P-450 system." This is not supported by data. Also unsupported is the incorrect statement taken from Schultz et al's Rational Phytotherapy that phototoxicity may occur at hypericin plasma concentrations of 50 mcg/mL. This should have read 50 mcg/L (or 50 ng/mL) as the original paper reported. Also not useful is the daily dosage recommendation of 200 - 1000 mcg hypericin for depression; one might conclude that there is evidence for this. While this book is sold as a mainstream reference it may be somewhat daunting for the layman. It's well-organized style and the provision of recent scientific and medical references will make it a useful starting place for more in depth research for health-care professionals. Perhaps the publication of an erratum could be recommended.
Rating:
Summary: PDR for Herbal Medicines
Review: This second edition is the most up-to-date and comprehensive reference on herbal products. It goes well beyond other books on herbal medicines. It has a list of marketed herbal products with their brand names. It gives doctors latest research data from primary medical literature, such as Lancet, BMJ. I would strongly recommend other healthcare professionals to buy this reference book to answer patient's questions.
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