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[[File:Curandera performing a limpieza.jpg|thumb|[[Curandera]] performing a () in Cuenca, Ecuador]]
A folk healer is an unlicensed person who practices the art of healing using traditional practices, herbal medicine and the power of suggestion.
The Foxfire books, consisting of 12 original books, is a collection of written entries that have been comprised to preserve Appalachia. Inside these books, readers can find a variety of recipes, how-tos, and descriptions of what it was like to live in rural Appalachia before technology was widely adopted. These books have been viewed as a source of the very intimate daily life of rural Appalachians throughout history and are believed to perpetuate the values and belief systems of the people of the time, and, arguably, of the region today.
Foxfire volume 11 specifically elaborates on common herbal remedies and healing procedures of historic Appalachia, all of which had been created and passed down through families and folk healers. Book 11 also details tasks such as how to grow a successful garden, beekeeping, and the effective and proper ways to Preserved food.
Folk medicine in Appalachia has historically included non-traditional methods of treating skin cancer. In the early 1900s, for example, a Virginia man named Thomas Raleigh Carter became renowned for his prowess in healing skin cancer in addition to his midwifery. Although he was a minister, his treatments focused on the application or ingestion of specific herbs and plants rather than on faith in a higher power. Carter kept his formula secret, even from his immediate family, and treated many people for lesions and skin conditions believed to be cancerous.
Women throughout history were typically the ones who were concerned with the physical demands of pregnancy and childbirth. A large majority of the earliest forms of folk healing focused on a woman's body during these life stages. Because of this, folk healers have come to be associated with women's fertility, something the religious institutions at the time grew dissatisfied with. The men who dominated these religious spaces wanted to have the main control over fertility as a way to exert their power. However, folk healers did not stop their work with pregnancy and childbirth and often became very well-versed in the needs and potential complications that could come from childbirth in early history. Since folk healers refused to abandon this area of medicine, they were recognized as a negative force by religious institutions. This is why folk healers were often viewed as Witchcraft and became connected to the earliest forms of abortion care.
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