TEHRAN – The health ministry has held a workshop on principles and basic concepts of Persian medicine in accordance with the objective of integrating Persian medicine into the country’s healthcare system.

The two-day event aimed to promote the experts’ knowledge in Persian medicine, particularly in healthy lifestyle, as well as raise their awareness of the rules, guidelines, and national policy documents, the health ministry’s website reported.

During the workshop, prominent professors in Persian medicine discussed various topics including temperament, four senses of humor: phlegm (Balgham), blood (Dam), yellow bile (Safra'), and black bile (Sauda'), lifestyle measures, widely-used medicinal plants, and drug interactions.

Persian medicine experts

Around 500 Persian medicine experts are providing health and medical treatment services across the country.

More than 1,000 general practitioners who have passed the Persian medicine courses approved by the health ministry are also offering services, Mehr news agency quoted Nafiseh Hosseini-Yekta, the director of the health ministry’s Persian medicine office, as saying in June.

Currently, nine faculties of Persian medicine enroll students in the country’s universities, she added.

Training Persian medicine experts has always been at the top of the Persian medicine office’s agenda. Therefore, different skill courses have been developed and held under the supervision of the health ministry.

People highly welcome traditional medicine

On January 7, Hosseini-Yekta said surveys show that more than 80 percent of people in the country intend to benefit from Iranian traditional medicine, ILNA reported.

Their interest in traditional medicine has never faded, she said, adding that traditional medicine is being taught in universities.

Traditional medicine has its roots in the culture, customs, and traditions of Iranians and has always been of interest to them, the official highlighted.

With over five hundred graduates in the field and numerous research articles that have been published, the country has been able to improve its position by being ranked fourth in the production of science in the field of traditional medicine in the world, following China, India, and the United States.

She went on to say that traditional medicine and conventional medicine are complementary. Each of these medicines has unique capabilities that can be used together.

But it can only be prescribed by someone who has fully mastered both fields.

Unfortunately, extremists threaten people's health by either misusing their interest in traditional medicine or depriving them of the right to use the indigenous medicine of the country along with conventional medicine.

Over 300 drugs made from medicinal plants

More than 300 medicines are made out of 1,200 medicinal plants in the country. The production of medicines from plants in the country dates back to 1980.

About 4,400 natural products and over 2,000 traditional products are being supplied by domestic companies to the market.

So far, about 30,000 plant species have been identified in the world, with Iran's share of about 8,000 species which is more than the whole of species found in Europe.

The per capita consumption of medicinal plants in Iran is about one kilogram of dried plants, in other words, 83,000 tons of medicinal plants worth 1.2 trillion rials (around $4 million) are consumed in the country, while in Europe this amount is 900 grams and in the United States is 2.5 kilogram.

MT/MG