Recently a research article in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary medicine demonstrated improvements in cognitive performance after treatment with Bacopa extract.
The abstract can be found here
J Altern Complement Med. 2008 Jul;14(6):707-13.
Title:
Effects of a standardized Bacopa monnieri extract on cognitive performance, anxiety, and depression in the elderly: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.
Authors:
Calabrese C, Gregory WL, Leo M, Kraemer D, Bone K, Oken B.
Article Summary
The study was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial with a placebo run-in of 6 weeks and a treatment period of 12 weeks.
Fifty four elderly volunteers with an average age of 73.5 years were split into two groups. One group taking 300mg Bacopa extract per day and one placebo group.
Only Forty eight people completed the 12-week study with 24 in each group.
The two groups were subjected to a variety of cognitive tests including the following:
1:) Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test (AVLT),
2:) Stroop Task (ability to ignore irrelevant information),
3:)Divided Attention Task (DAT),
4:)Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS).
The group taking the Bacopa extract had improved scores in both the AVLT delayed word recall and the Stroop results compared to the placebo group.
AVLT=Auditory Verbal Learning Test
Stroop test
No adverse reations were observed when compared to the placebo group.
Tuesday 23 September 2008
Tuesday 15 January 2008
Potential Medicinal Plants for CNS Disorders
REVIEW ARTICLE
Potential Medicinal Plants for CNS Disorders:an Overview
Phytother Res. 2006 Dec;20(12):1023-35.
Kumar V.
This is a review article summarizing some important medicinal plants widely used to treat cognitive problems. They discuss Ginkgo biloba, St johns wort, Kava kava, valerian, Bacopa monniera and Convolvulus pluricaulis.
In Summary they say:
Although clinical trials have repeatedly shown the effectiveness of these herbal remedies, there is little effort put into extracting and developing drugs from these natural products for treating CNS disorders.
There are extensive programs aimed at developing anti-cancer drugs from natural sources but there is little effort aimed at identifying novel CNS-active drugs from natural sources.
There are several research papers evaluating traditional herbal remedies, and these generate more evidence justifying their therapeutic use.
Ginkgo biloba has structurally unique terpenic lactones- bilobalide and ginkgolides.
Ginkgo extract has been shown to have neuroprotective, metabolic and rheological effects and is taken to treat Alzheimers disease and vascular dementia.
Although there is structural similarity between ginkgolides and bilobalide there are few analogies between their CNS activity profile. The differences are probably due to the accessibility of their pharmacophore- t-butyl substituted cyco-pentane ring.
The synthetic cholinesterase inhibitors are tacrine, donepezil, rivastigmine, glantamine.
The adverse drug reactions were more than ten times more common than the Ginkgo extract (EGb)
Potential Medicinal Plants for CNS Disorders:an Overview
Phytother Res. 2006 Dec;20(12):1023-35.
Kumar V.
This is a review article summarizing some important medicinal plants widely used to treat cognitive problems. They discuss Ginkgo biloba, St johns wort, Kava kava, valerian, Bacopa monniera and Convolvulus pluricaulis.
In Summary they say:
Although clinical trials have repeatedly shown the effectiveness of these herbal remedies, there is little effort put into extracting and developing drugs from these natural products for treating CNS disorders.
There are extensive programs aimed at developing anti-cancer drugs from natural sources but there is little effort aimed at identifying novel CNS-active drugs from natural sources.
There are several research papers evaluating traditional herbal remedies, and these generate more evidence justifying their therapeutic use.
Ginkgo biloba has structurally unique terpenic lactones- bilobalide and ginkgolides.
Ginkgo extract has been shown to have neuroprotective, metabolic and rheological effects and is taken to treat Alzheimers disease and vascular dementia.
Although there is structural similarity between ginkgolides and bilobalide there are few analogies between their CNS activity profile. The differences are probably due to the accessibility of their pharmacophore- t-butyl substituted cyco-pentane ring.
The synthetic cholinesterase inhibitors are tacrine, donepezil, rivastigmine, glantamine.
The adverse drug reactions were more than ten times more common than the Ginkgo extract (EGb)
Monday 14 January 2008
Bacopa monnieri and epilepsy
Reseach Paper from December 2007
Title
Decreased glutamate receptor binding and NMDA R1 gene expression in hippocampus of pilocarpine-induced epileptic rats: Neuroprotective role of Bacopa monnieri extract
A nice paper well researched.
Summary:
The paper uses rats as an experimental model of epilepsy. The model of temporal lobe epilepsy in rats is induced with pilocarpine treatment.
The amino acid glutamate is an exitatory neurotransmitter
Epileptic seizures are thought to be caused by excessive amounts of the
amino acid glutamate being released by neurons.
The amino acid glutamate activates the NMDA receptors.
The model of epilepsy in rats showed that activity levels of glutamate dehydrogenase and the NMDA receptor are significantly different to control rats.
The epilepsy rats were treated with the Bacopa extract. They were then shown to have levels of glutamate dehyrogenase and receptor similar to normal rats.
The rats were tested with a maze, and they were timed in their escape. The epilepsy rats were significantly slower than normal rats. But when they were treated with Bacopa extract, they escaped in a similar time to the normal rats.
Current drugs used to treat epilepsy target the symptoms and not the cause of the problem. Additionally the drugs in use now can contribute to some cognitive deficits that are already evident in patients with epilepsy. Therefore the need to treat the cause of the disease is very
important.
Bacopa extract appears to have some interesting properties regarding treatment of epilepsy, but the big pharmaceutical companies will not be interested in developing Bacopa based treatments because the plant can be so easily be grown and used by anybody. They would not be able to patent a specific drug, as it would be a natural product. Hopefully there is enough funding in the academic sector and it is worth further research.
Title
Decreased glutamate receptor binding and NMDA R1 gene expression in hippocampus of pilocarpine-induced epileptic rats: Neuroprotective role of Bacopa monnieri extract
A nice paper well researched.
Summary:
The paper uses rats as an experimental model of epilepsy. The model of temporal lobe epilepsy in rats is induced with pilocarpine treatment.
The amino acid glutamate is an exitatory neurotransmitter
Epileptic seizures are thought to be caused by excessive amounts of the
amino acid glutamate being released by neurons.
The amino acid glutamate activates the NMDA receptors.
The model of epilepsy in rats showed that activity levels of glutamate dehydrogenase and the NMDA receptor are significantly different to control rats.
The epilepsy rats were treated with the Bacopa extract. They were then shown to have levels of glutamate dehyrogenase and receptor similar to normal rats.
The rats were tested with a maze, and they were timed in their escape. The epilepsy rats were significantly slower than normal rats. But when they were treated with Bacopa extract, they escaped in a similar time to the normal rats.
Current drugs used to treat epilepsy target the symptoms and not the cause of the problem. Additionally the drugs in use now can contribute to some cognitive deficits that are already evident in patients with epilepsy. Therefore the need to treat the cause of the disease is very
important.
Bacopa extract appears to have some interesting properties regarding treatment of epilepsy, but the big pharmaceutical companies will not be interested in developing Bacopa based treatments because the plant can be so easily be grown and used by anybody. They would not be able to patent a specific drug, as it would be a natural product. Hopefully there is enough funding in the academic sector and it is worth further research.
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