Crocus sativus (saffron), an Herb with a History as Long as the History of Iran with Psychotropic Effects

Abstract

There is no ideal medication for a number of psychiatric and neurologic syndromes. In another words, some patients do not respond properly to synthetic medications or cannot tolerate the possible side effects. In this situation, alternative medicine and in particular herbal medicine can play an important role in the treatment. Of course, we should consider the principals of evidence based medicine in the application of alternative medicine. In this review, we focus on Crocus sativus, a Persian herb with history as long as the history of Iran. Recently a number of products from saffron have been presented for psychiatric and neurologic syndromes.

Keywords

• <i>crocus sativus</i>
• alzheimer's disease
• depression
• dementia