Folk Medicine

<p >The term&nbsp;<b>folk medicine</b>&nbsp;refers to&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healing" title="Healing" >healing</a>&nbsp;practices and ideas of body&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physiology" title="Physiology" >physiology</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health" title="Health" >health</a>&nbsp;preservation known to a limited segment of the population in a culture, transmitted informally as general knowledge, and practiced or applied by anyone in the culture having prior experience.<sup id="cite_ref-0" class="reference" ><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_medicine#cite_note-0" >[1]</a></sup></p>

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Folk medicine may also be referred to as&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_medicine" title="Traditional medicine" >Traditional medicine</a>,&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine" title="Alternative medicine" >Alternative medicine</a>,&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigenous_medicine" title="Indigenous medicine" class="mw-redirect" >Indigenous medicine</a>,&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complementary_medicine" title="Complementary medicine" class="mw-redirect" >Complementary medicine</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_medicine" title="Natural medicine" class="mw-redirect" >Natural medicine</a>.&nbsp;</p>

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These terms are often considered interchangeable, even though some authors may prefer one or the other because of certain overtones they may be willing to highlight. In fact, out of these terms perhaps only&nbsp;<i>Indigenous medicine</i>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<i>Traditional medicine</i>&nbsp;are the terms well&nbsp;<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congruent" title="Congruent" class="mw-redirect" >congruent</a>&nbsp;with&nbsp;<i>folk medicine</i>, while others should be understood rather in modern or modernized context.<sup id="cite_ref-1" class="reference" ><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_medicine#cite_note-1" >[2]</a></sup></p>