An Ethnomedicine Study of Traditional Healers as Joint Pain Therapy in Bantul District, Yogyakarta

Abstract

Joint pain is a sign of disorders of the musculoskeletal system. In joint pain, there will usually be discomfort in the joints, swelling, inflammation, and stiffness that can cause movement restrictions. Bantul is the district with the lowest prevalence of joint disease in Yogyakarta. The low prevalence of joint disease can be related to the culture of the community in using traditional herbs to treat the disease. The purpose of this study was to analyze the types of plants used in making potions to treat joint pain complaints, find out how to process the plants used, and know how to use herbs to treat joint pain. Traditional knowledge about local and native plants used was collected by field surveys. 48 healers from 3 hamlets in Bantul District, Yogyakarta were obtained by snowball sampling technique. An amount of 47 herbal potions were recorded as being applied for joint pain treatment. They used 33 plants relating to 18 families and the highest-used family was Zingiberaceae. Raw materials are processed by washing, boiling, pounding, grinding, pulverizing, and squeezing. There are two ways of using herbs to treat joint pain using the traditional herbs orally and topically (compresses). This study shows that most of the people in the Bantul District still depend on medicinal plants to treat diseases. Nevertheless, there are only a few traditional healers, there is a great danger that traditional knowledge will soon be lost because the young generation is not concerned about continuing this custom.