Ethnobotanical study of plants used in managing depression within Lagos metropolis Nigeria

Antidepressant drugs continue to raise concerns about their side effects, which include suicide, clinical worsening of depression, and unusual changes in behavior of adolescents and children. Recently, the FDA instructed all drug manufacturers to add black box warnings (the most serious warning label for a prescription medicine) to their antidepressant drugs. In light of these findings, doctors and patients are seeking safer alternative therapies. An ethnobotanical survey of medicinal and poisonous plants was conducted amongst herb sellers in major open markets in Lagos metropolis, Nigeria. Data was collected by the authors using classical descriptive ethnobotanical techniques (i.e. no quantitative measures) through an unstructured open ended interview. A total of 48 ethnomedicinal plant species distributed in 12 families are documented in this study. The medicinal plants used are listed with Latin name, family, local name, parts used, mode of preparation and duration of treatment. The majority of the remedies were prepared from freshly collected plant material from the wild. They are mainly taken orally as single plants, but some applications were prepared with a mixture of plants or ingredients such as honey, salt, palm oil and pepper. Decoction of the leaves was the main form of preparation (68%) and leaf powder was mostly used for the preparation of infusions (16%). The need for the use of stem and root barks increases when the leaves are not available. These plants can serve as sources of new alternatives for managing depressive symptoms through exploitation of novel pharmacological agents.