RESUMO
Kampo medicines, boiling water extracts of several kinds of herbal medicines, has been widely used for the clinical treatments in Japan. This medicine was created in China and brought to Japan via Korean peninsula at 5th century and has followed an independent course of development in Japan. But a modern scientific knowledge on Kampo medicines are still lacking, so this precious properties are slighted by modern medical treatment.<br>Last twenty five years, we have investigated the Kampo medicine chemically and pharmacologically to change this situation. In this paper, few topics will be discussed as shown bellow.<br>1) Difference between Kampo medicines and modern western medicines<br>2) Structural transformation of ingredients of crude drug<br>3) What is Kampo medicines based on components<br>4) Biological evaluation of some Kampo medicines<br>a. Effects of Sho-saiko-to toward the expression of P450mRNA<br>b. Effects of some Kampo formula toward the AD models<br>c. Effects of some Kampo formula toward the rheumatic models