Survey of Traditional Birth Attendants in Sagbama and Southern Ijaw Local Government Areas of Bayelsa State

Abstract

The indigenous people of Ijaw in Southern Nigeria are endowed with a deep culture of Traditional birth attendance, and they make use of medicinal plants in their practice to assist in ante- and post-natal cares. It is therefore imperative to document their rich knowledge to avoid its extinction. The work was performed with the aim of identifying and documenting the botanicals employed by the traditional birth attendants in some Ijaw tribes of Bayelsa State. The study was carried out by employing semi-structured questionnaires amidst personal interviews which were administered to forty-five traditional birth attendants (TBAs) between April and August 2019 to obtain information. Thirty-six medicinal plant species belonging to thirty-five genera within twenty- four families were mentioned by the TBAs mostly for labour induction (22.04%). Female fertility (14.47%) threatened abortion (13.49%) and foetal development (10.20%) were treated with Ageratum conyzoides (L.) L. (Compositae), Vernonia amygdalina Delile (Compositae), Bryophyllum pinnatum (Lam.) Oken and Acanthaceae, respectively making the Compositae the most important family. Of these, V. amygdalina was the most cited plant by the TBAs with frequency index (FI) of 44.44, while B. pinnatum ranked the next with FI=40.00. The survey provides an authentic data from TBAs for documentation which will be helpful for researchers in drug development as well as preserving the cultural heritage towards increasing the health manpower of the country.