Vol.:(0123456789) 1 3 Advances in Traditional Medicine https://doi.org/10.1007/s13596-020-00495-x RESEARCH ARTICLE Diversity of plants used in the management of hypertension by three associations of traditional healers along a climate gradient in Burkina Faso Souleymane Compaore 1,2  · Lazare Belemnaba 1  · Achille Hounkpevi 3  · Rodrigue Idohou 3  · Issouf Zerbo 2  · Sylvin Ouedraogo 1  · Adjima Thiombiano 2 Received: 30 March 2020 / Accepted: 14 August 2020 © Institute of Korean Medicine, Kyung Hee University 2020 Abstract Hypertension is a global public health problem. This study aimed to determine the diversity of plant species used by tradi- tional healers. Thus, semi-structured interviews were carried out with 195 informants through traditional healers associa- tions of Sanmatenga, Bazega and Zounweogo located in diferent phytogeographical sectors. Questionnaire referred mainly to plants vernacular names, organs used and recipes formulation. Citation frequencies and use values were calculated for each plant. Data were then submitted to comparison tests and multivariate statistics in R program. Traditional healers of Sanmatenga, Bazega and Zounweogo used respectively 70 species, 64 and 88 species for the hypertension management. However, the Jaccard index of similarity showed that there was no similarity between three associations demonstrating the importance of climatic gradient in the availability of species used. The age, sex and association belonging traditional healer did not infuence species richness but, were determinants for use patterns of the plant. These results show that a sociodemo- graphic parameter alone cannot be decisive for several local knowledge at once, but rather the interaction with other factors. Thus, the sustainable use of plant resources by the traditional healers recommends that the efects of this interaction of the various factors be taken into account. Keywords Healers · Survey · Hypertension · Management Introduction Hypertension is a public health problem recognized world- wide (Kearney et al. 2005) and it alone is responsible for 14% of deaths globally (Mahmood et al. 2018). In Bur- kina Faso, the national prevalence rate of the disease was 17.6% while a study conducted in Sanmatenga province in the north-central part of the country showed a prevalence rate of 9.4% (Doulougou et al. 2014). Hypertension is a risk factor for stroke, heart attack and other cardiovascular problems (Cohen 2009). There are several methods for the management of the disease. These methods range from changes in lifestyle, including weight loss, to conventional medications. Also, conventional treatment of hypertension exists but remains expensive, often difcult to access for poor people and requires self-management (Wright et al. 2018). This situation directs patients to traditional rem- edies. The use of medicinal plants in Burkina Faso to treat various diseases, including hypertension, is estab- lished. Ethnobotanical and ethnopharmacological surveys Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s13596-020-00495-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Souleymane Compaore scompaore30@yahoo.com 1 Département Médecine, Pharmacopée Traditionnelles et Pharmacie (MEPHATRA/PH), Institut de Recherche en Sciences de la Santé (IRSS), 03 BP 7047, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso 2 Laboratoire de Biologie et Ecologie Végétales, Université Joseph KI-ZERBO, UFR/SVT, 03 BP 7021, Ouagadougou 03, Burkina Faso 3 Laboratoire de Biomathématiques et d’Estimations Forestières (LABEF), Faculté des Sciences Agronomiques, Université d’Abomey-Calavi, 04 BP 1525 Cotonou, Bénin