Abstract
Liver disease is one of the most risk factors threatening human health. It is of great significance to find drugs that can treat liver diseases, especially for acute and chronic hepatitis, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, and liver cancer. The search for drugs with good efficacy from traditional natural medicines has attracted more and more attention. Tibetan medicine, one of the China's traditional medical systems, has been widely used by the Tibetan people for the prevention and treatment of liver diseases for hundreds of years. The present paper summarized the natural Tibetan medicines that have been used in Tibetan traditional system of medicine to treat liver diseases by bibliographic investigation of 22 Tibetan medicine monographs and drug standards. One hundred and ninety three species including 181 plants, 7 animals, and 5 minerals were found to treat liver diseases in traditional Tibetan medicine system. The most frequently used species are Carthamus tinctorius, Brag-zhun, Swertia chirayita, Swertia mussotii, Halenia elliptica, Herpetospermum pedunculosum, and Phyllanthus emblica. Their names, families, medicinal parts, traditional uses, phytochemicals information, and pharmacological activities were described in detail. These natural medicines might be a valuable gift from the old Tibetan medicine to the world, and would be potential drug candidates for the treatment of liver diseases. Further studies are needed to prove their medicinal values in liver diseases treatment, identify bioactive compounds, elucidate the underlying mechanism of action, and clarify their side effects or toxicity with the help of modern phytochemical, pharmacological, metabonomics, and/or clinical trial methods.
Highlights
Liver disease, one of the most risk factors threatening human health, is the fifth most common cause of death worldwide after heart disease and stroke (Williams, 2006), mainly including alcoholic liver disease (ALD), non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), chronic viral hepatitis, autoimmune hepatitis (AIH), hepatic schistosomiasis (HS), liver cirrhosis (LC), hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), and so forth (Wang et al, 2014)
It is recognized that traditional Tibetan medicine has a good curative effect in the treatment of liver diseases, rheumatism, acute and chronic mountain sicknesses, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and stomach diseases
We have attempted to generalize and congregate the names, original species, families, medicinal parts, traditional uses, and pharmacological information on natural Tibetan medicines traditionally used in the Tibetan system of medicine for liver diseases treatment
Summary
One of the most risk factors threatening human health, is the fifth most common cause of death worldwide after heart disease and stroke (Williams, 2006), mainly including alcoholic liver disease (ALD), non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), chronic viral hepatitis (e.g., hepatitis B virus and hepatitis C virus infections), autoimmune hepatitis (AIH), hepatic schistosomiasis (HS), liver cirrhosis (LC), hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), and so forth (Wang et al, 2014). NAFLD has become an important cause of chronic liver disease in developed countries, and its incidence has been increasing significantly in recent years. HCC accounts for ∼75% of liver cancer cases (Petrick et al, 2016). It is one of the most common malignant tumors in the world, especially in Asia, Africa, and Europe. Hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections affect at least 2 and 150 million people worldwide, respectively (Wang et al, 2014)
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