Departament de Psicobiologia, Facultat de Psicologia, Universitat de València.
Departament de Farmacologia, Facultat de Farmàcia, Universitat de València.
Planta Med. 2021 Aug;87(9):656-685. doi: 10.1055/a-1338-1011. Epub 2021 Jan 12.
Medicinal plants and their extracts are natural remedies with enormous potential for treating various diseases, including depression and anxiety. In the case of depression, hundreds of plants have traditionally been used in folk medicine for generations. Different plant extracts and natural products have been analyzed as potential antidepressant agents with validated models to test for antidepressant-like effects in animals, although other complementary studies have also been employed. Most of these studies focus on the possible mediators implicated in these potential effects, with dopamine, serotonin, and noradrenaline being the principal neurotransmitters implicated, both through interference with receptors and with their metabolism by monoamino oxidases, as well as through neuro-endocrine and neuroprotective effects. There are approximately 650 reports of antidepressant-like medicinal plants in PubMed; 155 of them have been compiled in this review, with a relevant group yielding positive results. Saffron and turmeric are the most relevant species studied in both preclinical and clinical studies; St. John's wort or kava have also been tested extensively. To the best of our knowledge, no review to date has provided a comprehensive understanding of the biomolecular mechanisms of action of these herbs or of whether their potential effects could have real benefits. The purpose of this narrative review is to provide an update regarding medicinal plants from the year 2000 to the present to examine the therapeutic potential of these antidepressant-like plants in order to contribute to the development of new therapeutic methods to alleviate the tremendous burden that depression causes worldwide.
药用植物及其提取物是具有巨大潜力的天然疗法，可以治疗多种疾病，包括抑郁症和焦虑症。在抑郁症的情况下，数百种植物在传统医学中被世代用于民间。不同的植物提取物和天然产物已被分析为具有潜在抗抑郁作用的药物，并使用验证模型在动物身上测试抗抑郁样作用，尽管也进行了其他补充研究。这些研究大多集中在这些潜在作用中可能涉及的介质上，多巴胺、血清素和去甲肾上腺素是主要的神经递质，它们通过干扰受体和单胺氧化酶代谢，以及通过神经内分泌和神经保护作用而涉及其中。在 PubMed 中有大约 650 份关于具有抗抑郁作用的药用植物的报告；在这篇综述中，对其中的 155 份进行了汇编，并对一个相关的研究组进行了阳性结果分析。藏红花和姜黄是在临床前和临床研究中研究最多的相关物种；圣约翰草或卡瓦也已被广泛测试。据我们所知，迄今为止，没有任何综述能全面了解这些草药的生物分子作用机制，也无法确定它们的潜在作用是否能带来真正的益处。本叙述性综述的目的是提供 2000 年至今药用植物的最新信息，以研究这些具有抗抑郁作用的植物的治疗潜力，为开发新的治疗方法以减轻抑郁症在全球造成的巨大负担做出贡献。
