Abstract:

The use of unani medicines is one of the oldest forms of healthcare known to humanity and has been used in all cultures throughout history. Unani medicines derived from plants are being increasingly utilized to treat a wide variety of clinical diseases .Our dependence on medicinal plants has in no way been minimized by the use of modern system of synthetic drugs. Demand for medicinal plant is increasing in both developing and developed countries due to growing recognition of natural products, being non-narcotic, having no or minimal side-effects, easily available at affordable cost and sometimes the only source of health care available to the poor. A marked growth in the worldwide phytotherapeutic market has occurred over the last 25 years and has thus attracted the interest of most large pharmaceutical companies to manufacture herbal preparations. However in this techno-sawy era, various challenges are encountered with herbal medicines including unani medicines like assessment of safety and efficacy of quality control, safety monitoring, regulatory status, etc. The exigency of standardization of Unani medicine has arisen to combat these challenges. Thus standardization of Unani medicines (both single and compound) has become rudimentary. Standardization of a drug means confirmation of its identity, quality and purity throughout all phases of its cycle i.e. its preparation, shelf life, storage and uses by various parameters. WHO has given various parameters for the process of standardization and evaluation of herbal drugs? These include organoleptic, botanical, physical, chemical and biological. These parameters provide requirements for the development of Unani medicine for its identification, purity, safety and efficacy and are crucial for preparation of accurate and potent formulation to follow GMP and GLP standards as per various regulatory authorities varying in different countries across the globe.