Taxus Baccata

Avicenna introduced the medicinal use of Taxus Baccata for phytotherapy in The Canon of Medicine. He named this herbal drug as "Zarnab" and used it as a cardiac remedy. This was the first known use of a calcium channel blocker drug, which were not in wide use in the Western world until the 1960s.
The precursors of chemotherapy drug Paclitaxel can be derived from the leaves of European Yew, which is a more renewable source than the bark of the Pacific Yew (Taxus brevifolia). This ended a point of conflict in the early 1990s; many environmentalists, including Al Gore, had opposed the harvesting of yew for paclitaxel cancer treatments. Docetaxel (another taxane) can then be obtained by semi-synthetic conversion from the precursors.
The Central Himalayas, the plant is used as a treatment for breast and ovarian cancer.