SHPIS: A Database of Medicinal Plants from Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Many studies in the past have revealed the use of the indigenous medicinal plant for the treatment of various diseases in Saudi Arabia. However, the details of these indigenous essential medicinal herbs and their therapeutic implication against various human and animals diseases are not well documented and organised in a local platform. In this regard, a thorough mining of scholarly article for information on local herbal remedies available and used by communities of Saudi Arabia was performed. The research revealed a unique insight into the natural herbal resource of Saudi Arabia with as many as 120 varieties of the medicinal plant from Saudi Arabia. Therefore, in order to provide a structured platform to store and retrieve relevant information pertaining to an indigenous medicinal plant of Saudi Arabia, a Saudi Herbal Plants Information System was built using waterfall model. MySQL an open source Relational Database Management System and server-side scripting language Hypertext Pre-processor was used to build an interactive dynamic web portal of the Saudi Herbal Plants Information System. The designed web portal allows visitors to access information on herbs available in the herbal database for research and development.