Medicinal Plants and Alzheimer's Disease : Integrating Ethnobotanical and contempory Scientific Evidence

Author(s): Perry, E. K., Pickering, A. T. , Wang, W. W. , Houghton, P. , Perry, N. S. L.

Journal/Book: J Alternat Complement Med. 1998; 4(4): 419-428.

Abstract: The use of complementary medicines such as plant extracts in dementia therapy, varies according to the different cultural traditions. In orthodox Western medicine, contrasting with that in China and the Far East for example, pharmacological properties of traditional cognitive or memory enhancing plants have not been widely investigated in the context of current models of Alzheimer's disease. An exception is Ginkgo biloba in which the ginkgolides have antioxidant, neuroprotective, and cholinergic activities relevant to Alzheimer's disease mechanisms. The therapeutic efficacy of Ginkgo biloba extracts in Alzheimer's disease in placebo-controlled clinical trials is reportedly similar cally based hypothesis of cholinergic derangement in Alzheimer's disease emerged, plants now known to contain cholinergic antagonists were recorded for their amnesic and dementia-inducing properties.

Keyword(s): alzheimer. phyto.

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