Prevalence and Patterns of Herbal Medicine use in Bayelsa State: Potential Customers Victimology Insight for Behavioural Forensics

The need to affirm the ever rising patronage of herbal medicine through the prevalence and patterns with the view to explore potential victimology insight for behavioural forensics necessitated this study. The data of the study was generated from 1200 participants drawn from eight LGAs using structured questionnaire as instrument. Findings from the study revealed high prevalence (91.17 %) of herbal medicine use; age, sex, educational level and income were associated with herbal medicine use. The study also revealed that age group 30 – 39 years (34.74 %) of the studied population was found to be the predominant participants that used herbal medicine, more females (53.11 %) used herbal medicine compared to males (46.89 %), participants with primary school level of education were found to be the major users of herbal medicine followed by participants with secondary school level of education (31.17 %), also, low income earners were found to be the predominant users of herbal medicines. Non-infection (sex enhancement, weight loss, fertility), anti-infection (malaria, typhoid, cough, STDs), pains/pregnancy management, and others 34.55 %, 30.99 %, 25.05 %, and 9.41 % respectively were the health issues herbal medicine was used to manage by the participants. Findings from the study portrayed likely vulnerabilities of the participants to potential victims of sharp medical practices or medical fraud.