Ethnomedicinal study of the flora of Sellay Pattay valley, District Malakand, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

Abstract

Background: Plants are the basic source of medicines to treat and remediate different health concerns. The current study was aimed to evaluate the knowledge of folk medicinal Flora in Sellay Pattay valley, district Malakand, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Methods: Ethnomedicinal study was carried out to document the indigenous knowledge about the use of medicinal plants. The data was gathered through interviews with randomly chosen informants in the field. The obtained data from informants were analyzed through various statistical indices such as Frequency citation (RFC), Relative frequency citation (RFC), Use relative (UR), Use value (UV), Fidelity level (FL), and Informant consensus factor (ICF). Results: A total of 111 plant species belonged to 58 families were documented, amongst them Lamiaceae was the leading family with 12 species. The highest use value (Uv) was recorded for Justicia adhatoda L. (0.98), while the lowest value (0.24) was recorded for Myosotis alpestris F.W.Schmidt. The highest frequency citation was reported for Morus alba L. with a value of 150 and the lowest was depicted for Calotropis procera (Aiton) Dryand. with a value of 28. The highest relative frequency citation was recorded for Morus alba L. 0.50, and lowest value for Malvastrum coromandelianum (L.) Garcke with 0.08. The plants including Amaranthus viridis L., Rumex hastatus D. Don, Eucalyptus camaldulensis Dehnh., Justicia adhatoda L., and Ajuga bracteosa Wall. ex Benth. had the highest FL with 98.88% against specific disorders and Acacia modesta Wall., Olea ferruginea Wall. ex Aitch., Ziziphus oxyphylla Edgew., Morus nigra L., and Dysphania botrys (L.) Mosyakin & Clemants were having more than 80% FL. Diabetes was the top ranked disease with a relatively higher Informant consensus factor (ICF) of 0.91, followed by muscular and sexual diseases with ICF of 0.88. It was observed that leaves of the plants play an important role in the treatment of various disorders and their percentage contribution was recorded as 66%. Conclusions: Sellay Pattay valley has a huge diversity of medicinal plants. The maximum number of therapeutic taxa were used in the mode of decoction for effective work against specific disorders accounts for 54% percent of all medicinal plants. The dependency of people were relied on therapeutic plants due to easy availability and low prices. However, the use of these taxa showed no side effects with proper recipes.