"MEDICINAL PLANTS PRIORITY FOR CONSERVATION IN RIVERSIDE COMMUNITIES OF THE AMAZON ESTUARY, PARÁ, BRAZIL"
Ethnobotany. Medicinal species. Conservation. Amazon estuary.
The theme of this research is centered on the knowledge and use of medicinal plants with a focus on the Amazon estuarine region. Based on secondary data obtained from a survey of studies on medicinal species used in riverside communities in the estuarine region of the Pará River, this work aimed to identify which of these plants deserve special attention in priority conservation actions. Studies were collected from online databases; other literature sources were Brazilian journals (open to topics in Ethnobiology and Ethnobotany). Twenty publications (journal articles) conducted over the past 35 years (period ranged from 1985 to 2020) were selected, and the ethnobotanical information compiled into a database. The analyses devoted to the selection of the most important medicinal species were qualitative and quantitative, including the indexes of Relative Importance (RI), Sensitivity (SI) and Importance Value (IVI), as well as consultation of national and international official lists (CNCFLORA and IUCN), complemented with information from the collection of the Laboratory of Ethnobotany and Economic Botany of the Emílio Goeldi Museum of Pará (COBOT/MPEG). The total richness was 343 species, distributed in 84 botanical families, especially Fabaceae, Lamiaceae and Asteraceae. Regarding the vegetative parts used, leaves (206), bark (66), roots (56), fruits (38), seeds (26), stem and latex (exudate) (20 respectively), and whole plant (17) stood out, and tea was the preparation method most often mentioned in the papers (231). The symptoms and diseases reported were included in 16 categories according to the International Classification of Primary Care – ICPC-2, being the category 'D - Digestive' the most representative (20.55%), whose most cited symptom was diarrhea (15.13%). Carapa guianensis was the most cited species (12), with more therapeutic indications (26), also stands out with great versatility regarding its uses presenting maximum value of IR (1.88). Socratea exorrhiza obtained the highest value for IS = 0.99. Seven species were indicated with high conservation priority, of which Virola surinamensis stood out (IVI = 3.90). The ethnobotanical research in the Amazon estuary region was important for listing the plants used mainly in basic health care in the different riverside communities of the Pará River estuary, having made it possible to understand some factors that interfere in the conservation of medicinal plants.