The ethnobotanical path to patients: Translational challenges in biomedical innovation

Title : The ethnobotanical path to patients: Translational challenges in biomedical innovation

Abstract:

Traditional medicine occupies a central place in healthcare across sub-Saharan Africa, with medicinal plants forming the foundation of this practice. Over the past two decades, preclinical research has generated considerable evidence for the antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and anticancer potential of African plant species. However, the distance between what is reported in the laboratory and what becomes available as a standardized, clinically evaluated product remains very wide. This review examines the available preclinical evidence across the three pharmacological domains and discusses the factors that continue to limit translation. A comprehensive literature search was conducted using PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, and African Journals Online (AJOL). Search terms were combined systematically and covered peer-reviewed publications from January 2000 to December 2024. Preclinical evidence supports the antimicrobial potential of species including Combretum caffrum, Warburgia salutaris, Moringa oleifera, Pelargonium sidoides, and Sutherlandia frutescens against both common and drug-resistant pathogens. Anti-inflammatory effects mediated through cyclooxygenase inhibition, NF-kB suppression, and cytokine modulation have been demonstrated for several species, most notably Harpagophytum procumbens. Cytotoxic and pro-apoptotic activity has been reported across multiple cancer cell lines for compounds from Combretum caffrum, Catharanthus roseus, and Moringa oleifera, among others. The path from these findings to regulated therapeutic products is obstructed by three main problems: a lack of standardization and quality control, regulatory frameworks that were not designed with complex botanical preparations in mind, and a critical shortage of well-designed clinical trials. African medicinal plants hold genuine therapeutic promise but realizing that promise will require deliberate investment in standardization, fit-for-purpose regulatory pathways, and phytomedicine-specific clinical trial infrastructure. Collaboration between researchers, regulators, industry, and traditional health practitioners is necessary to move these findings from the bench to the patient.

Biography:

Prof Polo-Ma-Abiele Hildah Mfengwana is a South African health sciences researcher whose work centres on ethnopharmacology, drug discovery, and immunohematology. She is an Associate Professor and Head of the Health Sciences Department at the Central University of Technology, and her research focuses strongly on the preclinical development of anticancer agents derived from medicinal plants. Her scholarship explores the identification and characterisation of bioactive compounds, their efficacy, and their mechanisms of action, while also linking indigenous knowledge to modern oncology and therapeutic innovation. She has also contributed to research on medicinal plants with antibacterial, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, wound-healing, and related health applications.