Cai Ming, Ni Wei-Jian, Han Lan, Chen Wei-Dong, Peng Dai-Yin
Department of Pharmacy, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Anhui University of Chinese Medicine, Hefei, China.
Anhui University of Chinese Medicine, Hefei, China.
Front Pharmacol. 2021 Mar 16;12:626342. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2021.626342. eCollection 2021.
Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) acts as one of the most common, agnogenic and chronic inflammatory-autoimmune disorder which is characterized by persistent synovitis, cartilage destruction, and joint deformities, leads to a wide range of disabilities, and increased mortality, thus imposing enormous burdens. Several drugs with anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory properties such as celecoxib, diclofenac and methotrexate are being selected as conventional drugs in the allopathic system of medicine for the treatment of RA in clinic. However, there are some serious side effects more or less when using these drugs because of their short poor bioavailability and biological half-life for a long time. These shortcomings greatly promote the exploration and application of new low- or no-toxicity drugs for treating the RA. Meanwhile, a growing number of studies demonstrate that several herbs present certain anti-inflammatory and anti-arthritic activities through different enzymes and their derivatives, which indicate that they are promising therapeutic strategies when targeting these mediators based on herbal medicinal products in RA research. This review article summarizes the roles of the main enzymes and their derivatives during the pathogenesis of RA, and clearly clarifies the explicit and potential targeted actions of herbal medicinal products that have anti-RA activity. Our review provides timely and critical reference for the scientific rationale use of herbal medicinal products, with the increasing basic research and clinical application of herbal medicinal products by patients with RA.
类风湿性关节炎（RA）是最常见、病因不明的慢性炎症性自身免疫性疾病之一，其特征为持续性滑膜炎、软骨破坏和关节畸形，会导致多种残疾并增加死亡率，从而带来巨大负担。在临床治疗RA时，塞来昔布、双氯芬酸和甲氨蝶呤等几种具有抗炎和免疫调节特性的药物被选作现代医学体系中的常规药物。然而，由于这些药物生物利用度差且生物半衰期短，长期使用时或多或少会有一些严重的副作用。这些缺点极大地推动了治疗RA的新型低毒或无毒药物的探索与应用。与此同时，越来越多的研究表明，几种草药通过不同的酶及其衍生物呈现出一定的抗炎和抗关节炎活性，这表明在RA研究中基于草药产品靶向这些介质时，它们是有前景的治疗策略。这篇综述文章总结了主要酶及其衍生物在RA发病机制中的作用，并明确阐明了具有抗RA活性的草药产品的明确和潜在靶向作用。随着RA患者对草药产品的基础研究和临床应用不断增加，我们的综述为合理科学使用草药产品提供了及时且关键的参考。
