A Phytochemical and Ethnopharmacological Review of the Genus Erythrina

In 1978, the World Health Organization (WHO) recognized folk medicine and its beneficial effects to health, during the Alma Ata conference, which published in 1985 that approximatly 80% of the global population, resorted to traditional medicine as their primary health treatment (Herbarium, 2008). Medicinal plants have been used as a means of curing or preventing diseases, now called phytotherapy, in all regions of the world, with regional variations due to the influence of cultural characteristics of the population, as well as its flora, soil and climate (Lewinsohn, 2003).