| Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a common disease onset in aged people,especially in advanced aged people. Currently, there are approximately sixmillion patients in our country. Many developed countries has spent alarge fund and power to engage in basic study and drug screen concernedwith AD. At present, chemical drugs has some clinical limitation such aslower efficacy, much side-effect. However, in the traditional Chinesemedicine, tonifying kidney was employed to treat AD based on correlationbetween kidneyand brain.This study was designed to evaluate the pharmacologic action andmechanism of an effective medical formula named BuShenYizhidecoction, consisting of prepared rhizome of rehmannia, dioscorea root,asiatic cornelian cherry fruit, cortex moutan, poria cocos wolf, waterplantain tuber, tortoise plastron, bovine spinal cord, polygonati, andginseng, which was clinically used to treat Alzheimer's disease (AD). Inthe theory of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), Alzheimer's disease(AD) was considered as aphronesia or morbid forgetfulness. According tothe theory of TCM, the diseased region of AD is in the brain but theessence of pathological changes is mainly in the kidney. Furthermore, thefunctional disorder and Qi-blood aberration in other entrails includingheart, liver and spleen were also related to AD. The character ofpharmacologic changes was usually asthenia in origin and asthenia insuperficiality. Concretely, the asthenia in superficiality was relevant withdeficiency in essence, Qi and blood and the asthenia in origin concernedwith accumulation of phlegm, stagnant blood and endogenous fire. On thebasis of theory of QI-blood homologization, essence-Qi alternation andthe correlation among five viscera, we classified the syndrome about ADto six fundamental pattern of syndrome, including the deficiency in kidney essence-Qi, the deficiency in liver and kidney, the deficiency of the spleencausing stagnation of phlegm, the deficiency of vital energy causing bloodstasis, the stagnation of QI due to depression of the liver, the hyperactivityof heart-fire and liver-fire.According to the findings mentioned above, we concluded that thefeature of formula organize about BuShenYiZhi decoction was the jointuse of reinforcing and reducing method, paying equal attention toYin-Yang. In addition, not only asthenia in superficiality but also astheniain origin was gave consideration. The effects of BuShenYiZhi decoction,invigorating the kidney and regulating the liver, invigorating the spleenand quieting the heart, invigorating the Qi-blood, replenishing essence andmarrow, promoting blood flow and dissolving the stagnant blood andexcreting dampnes and eliminating phlegm included, showed the specialfeatures of TCM containing integrative modulation and emphasing originin treating disease.In the empirical study, three aspects including animal behaviourchanges, tissue morphologic changes and neuronal apoptosis wereconducted. Behaviour study showed that there are significant difference(P＜0.05 )between sham-operated group and AD model group. Concretly,avoid dark test showed error times in AD model group were more thanthat in middle-dose group (P＜0.05), so was time used to arrive atplatform in Morris water maze assay(P＜0.05). There are no difference inthe time staying in objective quadrant and the times passing the platform(P＜0.05).HE staining showed normal cell nucleus was blue-dark andcytoplasm was salmon pink, but dead cells showed no nucleus andcytoplasm was salmon pink. Nissle staining showed there are not Nisslebody in the cells of model group. Compared with model group,administration group showed different improvements in these two staining assay.Hoechst33258 staining showed well-distributed coloring in thenormal cell nucleus but bad-distributed coloring in the cells of modelgroup. Forthmore, fluorescence enhancement, chromatin concentration,nucleus split were also seen in model group. In the flowcytometer assay,Anexin V-FITC/PI double staning showed the quantity of valid apoptoticcells in the model group were more than that in sham-operated group. Thisphenomenon was inhibited by Nimodipine or BuShenYiZhi decoction.Moreover, the effect of BuShenYiZhi decoction was dose-dependent andthe higher dose, the much obvious effect but even if the effect ofhigh-dose group was not good as that of Nimodipine.Animal studies demonstrated that BuShenYiZhi decoction have theability to improve the disorders of spatial memory, performance memoryand passive learning and memory in ovariectomized and Aβadministrated rats. The underlying mechanism might be due to the actionsof protecting cortical and hippocampal neurons and antagonist neuronalapoptosis. Therefore, using BuShenYiZhi decoction, we can relieve,regulate and treat AD. |
PDF Full Text Request