Origin

Africa

Folk medicinal uses

the bark--- In Ghana, the bark is boiled with water and the liquid extract taken once a day for the cure of piles, intestinal and abdominal troubles and worms. The same prescription, sometimes mixed with the bark of Merinda lucida is drunk as a purgative for jaundice in Akwapim. The bark infusion after exposure to the sun in an open bottle is used in the Central African Republic for gonorrhoea, and the bark decoction is used there in enemas and sitz baths for colic and stomach troubles. The bark decoction is drunk or used in bath and vapour bath, as an antidote to poisoning and also for leprosy, gonorrhoea, menstrual troubles or as a purgative. The pulped bark is used an enema for Oxyuris (thread worm) and other intestinal parasites in children. For birth control of family planning, the bark of Anthocleista nobilis together with those of Bosqueia angolensis and Spathodea campanulata are boiled and a dose taken internally once a week. Part of the liquid is also applied as enema (Ghana Traditional medicine).

The root bark mixed with red pepper, ginger and guinea grain (Piper) is used by the Fantis as an enema for hernia (traditional medicine).

The roots steeped and mixed with guinea grain and pepper are used in the Central African Republic for piles.

The young green shoots are powdered and used in the Central African Republic for ulcers (Abbe Walker, 1953).

The leaf is a woman's medicine in Sierra Leone. A leaf decoction is taken with lemon for abdominal pains of uterine origin (DalZiel, 1936)

Some medicinal forest plants of Africa and Latin America 67/ FAO. – FAO: Rome, 1986. – p. 62