RESUMO
<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the effects of refining temperatures and amounts of sheep's oil used in processing Epimedii Folium on Kedney-yang deficiency rats.</p><p><b>METHOD</b>The corticosterone was subcutaneous injected to establish the kidney yang deficiency rat model. With the temperatures and amounts of sheep's oil were 250 degrees C/30%, 120 degrees C/30% and 120 degrees C/20% respectively, the crude drug and three kinds of pressed Epimedii Folium were extracted by water and used as examined samples while total flavonoid of Epimedii Folium was used as positive control. After examined samples and control samples were intragastirc administrated, the pharmacologic action was analyzed.</p><p><b>RESULT</b>As compared to crude drug, all of the aqueous extracts of processed Epimedii Folium have stronger effect of warming kidney and enhancing yang, especially the Epimedii Folium processed by sheep's oil with refining temperatures 120 degrees C and amounts of sheep's oil 30%. Its mechanism might be related to improving the insufficiency of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal-thymus (HPAT) axis suppression.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>The refining temperature of sheep's oil can affect the quality of excipients and processed drugs. The results may be useful in explaining the mechanism of Epimedii Folium processing and establishment of pharmaceutical standard of sheep's oil used as processing excipients.</p>
