An Ethnomedicine Approach to Aromatic Plant Use in Batimung Tradition of North Banjarmasin Subdistrict Banjarmasin, Indonesia

Abstract

Ethnomedicine is the study of the health-related indigenous knowledge of a particular ethnic group. Unique to the Banjar people is their use of fragrant plants blended by herbalists to treat illness, and the process is known as Batimung. Therefore, this study aimed to identify plants and the parts of aromatic plants used for practicing Batimung. It is a descriptive study with prospective observational data collection using purposive and quota sampling techniques. The number of therapist and user respondents were 5 and 98 people, respectively. The results showed that 27 types of plants were used, where 25 contained terpenoids. The plant parts used are leaves, flowers, bark, rhizomes, roots, fruit, stems and cobs. The approach entails boiling the plant materials and utilizing the resulting steam in the processing. In conclusion, the most widely used aromatic plant parts are the leaves and flowers of Citrus hystrix DC.