The Sunday Mail
THE Zimbabwe National Practitioners Association (ZINPA) founding president, Sekuru Friday Chisanyu, has urged traditional medical practitioners to document their practice to provide reference material for future generations.
Addressing a traditional medical practitioners’ stakeholders meeting last week, Sekuru Chisanyu said the younger generation is disadvantaged because of lack of relevant books.
“Medical doctors document their practices, they create records for the future doctors to read and refer, something we are failing to do.
“Let us document how we heal our patients. These documents will be used by the future generations,” he said.
Sekuru Chisanyu said over the years, there has been a belief that one can become a traditional medical practitioner through kusvikirwa, but herbalists can receive professional training.
“We need to impart knowledge to avoid unnecessary and dangerous experiments on patients. Therefore, I urge you to publish material so that herbalists can study and graduate like other professions,” he said.
“Herbalists need training and it doesn’t matter whether unorapa ne mudzimu or not. This explains why in universities we have departments that train such people.
“I am encouraging herbalists to go for training and that is the only way we can do away with fake herbalists who are misleading people. Our children will one day need to learn from us. Instead of passing knowledge through oral tradition, let’s put it into writing,” he said.
