[ effect of herbal drugs on neonatal jaundice]

ABSTRACT

Using herbal drugs is the common way for treatment of diseases in traditional and alternative medicine. These drugs have important role and strong cultural background among people in treatment of hyper-billirubinemia. It is necessary to evaluate the effect of herbal drugs by scientific methods. The goal of this study is to investigate the in vitro effect of common herbal drugs used traditionally in management of neonatal hyperbillirubinemia. in this study 0.5 cc of 5 common herbal drugs [Cichorium intybus, Fumaria parviflora, Zizyphus jujuba, Alhagi pseudoalhagi and Purgative manna] which are obtained by hydrochloric instillation were added to 1 ml of serum of jaundiced neonates and then the level of billirubin determined by Diazo blank method. This study revealed that only Cichorium intybus extract decreases the level of bilirubin significantly [p<0.05]. Other herbal drugs may decrease billirubin level with other mechanisms, for example by cathartic effect or activating of liver enzymes, but this study revealed that Cichorium intybus is the only drug that has direct decreasing effect on billirubin. For further investigation, we recommend to separate the effective substance of Cichorium intybus and determine its effectiveness in vivo