ABSTRACT
Pain is one of the most prevalent health problems. Current medications for pain are mainly anticonvulsants， tricyclic antidepressants， and opioidergic drugs. However， their therapeutic effectiveness is limited during application， and some even have severe side effects. In recent years， research on natural ingredients from Chinese herbal medicine has been extensively conducted for their analgesic activities. A series of natural ingredients represented by alkaloids， coumarins， flavonoids， and terpenoids have shown great analgesic activity， and further studies on their analgesic mechanism have found that most natural products have multi-target analgesic mechanisms. It can exert analgesic effects by blocking ion channels， regulating related receptors， or inducing anti-inflammatory or antioxidant effects. In addition， many traditional Chinese medicine （TCM） formulas have shown great analgesic ability after clinical application and have multiple complex analgesic mechanisms. The drug cloud （dCloud） theory can better describe the mechanisms， and it can represent the complete therapeutic spectrum of multi-target analgesics from two dimensions， namely the "direct efficacy" that directly inhibits pain signals and the "background efficacy" that targets the root causes of pain. The authors summarized the research progress of natural ingredients with analgesic effects found in Chinese herbal medicine so far， as well as the analgesic efficacy and potential mechanisms of TCM formulas with great analgesic effects in clinical applications， so as to provide a new basis for searching for new analgesic drugs from TCM.
ABSTRACT
Chronic heart failure (CHF) is a severe public health problem with increasing morbidity and mortality, any treatment targeting a single session is insufficient to tackle this. CHF is characterized by reduced cardiac output resulting from neurohumoral dysregulation and cardiac remodeling, which might be related to oxidative stress, inflammation, endoplasmic reticulum stress, apoptosis, autophagy, mitochondrial function, and angiogenesis. These molecular mechanisms interact with each other through crosstalk. Historically, Chinese medicinal herbs have been widely applied in the treatment of CHF, and therapeutic effects of Chinese medicinal herbs and their ingredients have been scientifically confirmed over the past decades. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) with multiple components can confront the different pathogenesis of CHF through multiple targets. This review analyzes commonly used TCM patent drugs and TCM decoctions that are applicable to different stages of CHF based on clinical trials. Diverse bioactive ingredients in Chinese medicinal herbs have been found to treat CHF via multiple molecular mechanisms. This review comprehensively covers the key works on the effects and underlying mechanisms of TCM, herbal ingredients and synergistic effects of constituent compatibility in treating CHF, providing additional ideas to address this threat.
ABSTRACT
Although a variety of regimens are available for the treatment of atopic dermatitis (AD), severe adverse reactions and unpopular costs often limit their usage. In contrast, certain inexpensive, naturally-occurring ingredients are proven effective for AD with fewer side effects. The beneficial effects of these ingredients can be attributed to inhibition of cytokine and chemokine expression, IgE production, inflammatory cell infiltration, histamine release, and/or the enhancement of epidermal permeability barrier function. Since herbal medicines are widely available, inexpensive and generally safe, they could be valuable alternatives for the treatment of AD, particularly for those patients who are not suitable for the utilization of immune modulators. In this review, we summarize the therapeutic benefits of natural ingredients for the treatment of AD and the mechanisms of their actions.