The WHO Herbal Dictionary
The use of drugs of natural origin is increasing in western populations. These drugs appear more and more as co-medication in clinical studies and in post-marketing surveillance.
An increasing number of clinical trials are being conducted in regions with other therapeutic traditions than the conventional western medicine – eg Indian Ayurveda, Japanese Kampo and Chinese Traditional medicine.
The incident with St John’s Wort has increased the awareness of herbals as potential interacting agents. St John’s Wort has been found to change the metabolism of several substances.
The WHO Herbal Dictionary (WHO-HD) is the first international dictionary of herbal products. The dictionary is used for identifying the names of herbal products, their active ingredients and therapeutic use, in the course of their drug safety surveillance. It translates a drug name to useful information, which is used for coding and analysis of drug safety data – both pre- and post- marketing.
The WHO Herbal Dictionary will help you
- find the trade names of herbal products and code them in your clinical data,
- translate the trade name into active ingredients – plants, parts of plants and extraction types,
- analyse the coded data by using the new unique Herbal ATC classification,
and thereby help you to identify patterns, increase your understanding of how herbal products may influence the action of your product and allow you to take necessary action.
The dictionary is closely related to the WHO Drug Dictionary and WHO Drug Dictionary Enhanced, it is used for the same purpose and is based on the same principles.
The WHO Herbal Dictionary is produced twice per year.
The release dates are:
For more information please read the release plan (pdf).
