Abstract
The clinical efficacy of standardized essential oils (such as Lavender officinalis), in treating anxiety disorders strongly suggests that these natural products are an important candidate source for new anxiolytic drugs. A systematic review of essential oils, their bioactive constituents, and anxiolytic-like activity is conducted. The essential oil with the best profile is Lavendula angustifolia, which has already been tested in controlled clinical trials with positive results. Citrus aurantium using different routes of administration also showed significant effects in several animal models, and was corroborated by different research groups. Other promising essential oils are Citrus sinensis and bergamot oil, which showed certain clinical anxiolytic actions; along with Achillea wilhemsii, Alpinia zerumbet, Citrus aurantium, and Spiranthera odoratissima, which, like Lavendula angustifolia, appear to exert anxiolytic-like effects without GABA/benzodiazepine activity, thus differing in their mechanisms of action from the benzodiazepines. The anxiolytic activity of 25 compounds commonly found in essential oils is also discussed.
Highlights
Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is characterized by a high and free-floating anxiety, revealing both psychic, and somatic symptoms.GAD maintains a significant prevalence and causes important personal, family, and social impairments, which makes adequate treatment of GAD patients essential.Pharmacological treatment of GAD usually employs benzodiazepines, azaspirone, and antidepressants
The essential plant oils found with our search strategy where anxiolytic-like effect was found were: Acantholippia deserticola, Achillea umbelata, Achillea wilhemsii, Alpinia zerumbet, Angelica sinensis, Chamaecypais obtuse, Casimiroa pringlei, Citrus aurantium, Citrus aurantium subsp. bergomia, Citrus junos, Citrus latifolia, Citrus limon, Citrus reticulate, Citrus sinensis, Coriandrum sativum var
Reviewing the results for essential oils in animal anxiety models, clear anxiolytic-like effect was found for Citrus aurantium, Cymbopogon citratus, Lavendula angustifolia, and Lippia alba
Summary
Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is characterized by a high and free-floating anxiety, revealing both psychic (e.g., tension, insomnia, etc.), and somatic symptoms (e.g., muscle tension, dry mouth, etc.).GAD maintains a significant prevalence and causes important personal, family, and social impairments, which makes adequate treatment of GAD patients essential.Pharmacological treatment of GAD usually employs benzodiazepines (e.g., diazepam and clonazepam), azaspirone (buspirone), and antidepressants (e.g., paroxetine). Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is characterized by a high and free-floating anxiety, revealing both psychic (e.g., tension, insomnia, etc.), and somatic symptoms (e.g., muscle tension, dry mouth, etc.). GAD maintains a significant prevalence and causes important personal, family, and social impairments, which makes adequate treatment of GAD patients essential. Pharmacological treatment of GAD usually employs benzodiazepines (e.g., diazepam and clonazepam), azaspirone (buspirone), and antidepressants (e.g., paroxetine). The anticonvulsant pregabalin has been introduced to treat GAD. All of these drug treatments have important drawbacks, such as abuse/dependence liability, retrograde amnesia (benzodiazepines), clinical effect delay (buspirone and antidepressants), sexual dysfunction (antidepressants), sedation (benzodiazepines and pregabalin), and dizziness (pregabalin), all of which affect clinical adherence [1].
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