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Working in physiotherapy or in rehabilitation we can benefit a lot from the knowledge of natural medicine. Wherever you work, in a hospital, health center or in a comunity based rehabilitation project, medicinal oils and ointments are from everyday use. Its not difficult to produce them. ANAMED International, the organisation in the field of natural medicine in Africa provides useful descriptions. Following you find informations abot this topic. The article is written and published by Dr. Hans Martin Hirt and the ANAMED stuff and published with their kind permission on this link.
In the last part of this page you find a description of a well known plant in the highlands of Lesotho: Artemisia afru. This plant is of a amazing medical potentiel and it is used by the popular and traditional medicine.

How to produce medicinal oils.
By Dr. Hans Martin Hirt and stuff (www.anamed.net)

Recipe: PLANT + OIL + HEAT = MEDICINAL OIL

First prepare a water bath: Put a pot one quarter filled with water on the stove. Another slightly smaller pot is placed in this pot. The ingredients are heated in this smaller pot. Place lids on both pots. The water bath guarantees that the temperature never rises above 100° C. Be sure that no water can go into the smaller pot even when it boils – if the oil in the inner pot is contaminated with water, the oil goes rancid much more quickly.
The leaves must be absolutely dry, so that no water enters your oil from the leaves. Use the best locally available vegetable oil: palm oil, palm kernel oil, shea butter, sunflower oil, peanut oil, ore any other vegetable oil that is kind to the skin.
Put the mixture into the water-bath and let the water simmer for 60 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes. Filter and leave to cool without stirring. This medicinal oil needs protection from sun, heat and air. Therefore store your oils and ointments in tightly closed containers. Fill them almost up to the top to minimise the amount of air. Never mix old products with new ones! When oil smell rancid throw them away straightaway.
Do not let yourself be attracted by commercial products because of their colour or perfume. Colourings and preservatives can cause allergies. Your home-made oils and ointments are certainly better for your health!
The ingredients for these recipes are given in volumetric units (e.g. mug, tin cup). The amounts for plants refer always to the dried, pulverised state.

To produce ointments, heat the plant material with the oil for 60 minutes in the water bath, as described above – without this the oil would be spoilt by overheating. Filter the oil while it is still hot. Put the residue in the filter on the compost heap. Melt the wax and filter it. Mix the filtered oil (still hot) with the filtered wax (still hot), and stir slowly for one minute.
The plant should be absolutely dry and pounded into powder. Use the best oil possible (e.g. palm kernel oil, olive oil for haemorrhoids or cosmetics, and cheaper oils such as palm oil or groundnut oil for massage or rheumatism.

The advantage of palm oil is that ointments prepared with it do not turn rank even after five years. If however, they are stored at a high temperatures, the ointments may become gritty. Warming them up briefly makes them easy to spread again.
Wax: To produce cosmetics or ointments for sensitive skin, use only beeswax. For massage or rheumatism ointments, you may use commercial wax; for small amounts colourless candles are quite adequate. The oil/wax mixture is far superior to Vaseline because Vaseline does not penetrate the skin. Contrary to common belief, Vaseline, called also “petroleum jelly”, is not good for your skin! It is like a plastic bag around your skin; so it is good to use it before doing a dirty job, e.g. repairing a bicycle or car. Never use it as a cosmetic for your face!

Keep ointments as cool as possible!

As mentioned above the widely spreadplant artemisia afra can be of helpfull use in the prevention and treatment of many daily health disorders.

Artemisia afra

Vernacular names: umhlonyane, umhlonyane omncane (Z)
Description: grey-green shrub with aromatic leaves and small, yellow-green, ball-shaped flowers; height 1-2 m.
Distribution: Transvaal, OFS, Natal, Cape, Namibia, Swaziland, Lesotho, Botswana.
Uses: leaf infusion as tea or enema used as emetic or for fever; crushed as steam infusion used for headaches, colds, measles; malaria;
ground plant suspended in milk as enema used for constipation, intestinal worms, decoctions used for acne, boils, diabetes (Z), leaf infusions used for colds, influenza (Transkei, Lesotho); whole plant used for respiratory illnesses, gastro-intestinal illness, gout, diabetes mellitus, menstrual chill after childbirth, bathing haemorhoids; eareche, toothache (S. Africa); Warmed leaves used as poultice for pimples, boils (T); warmed leaves used for mumps, sprains, babie´s colic, aching teeth (V); hay fever, asthma, coughs, bronchitis, gout (see text).

Caution: ingestion of essential oil leads to severe poisoning.

If you want to know more about natural remedies in physiotherapy and rehabilitation or on your daily work in a health clinic you will find more articles on the link publication.