Friday, July 13, 2012

(Phytochemicals in) Foods to Prevent and Treat diseases - Hepatitis

Hepatitis is characterized by the destruction of a number of liver cells and the presence of inflammatory cells in the liver tissue caused by excessive alcohol drinking, disorders of the gall bladder or pancreas, including medication side effects, and infections. There are many other infective agents that can cause inflammation of the liver, or hepatitis. However, the term is unfortunately commonly used to refer to a particular group of viruses such as Hepatitis A, B, and C.


Types of food to prevent and treat Hepatitis
1. Green tea and soy
Quercetin, a ubiquitous plant flavonoid, has been identified to inhibit NS3 activity in a specific dose-dependent manner in an in vitro catalysis assay, showed that quercetin has a direct inhibitory effect on the HCV NS3 protease. These results point to the potential of quercetin as a natural nontoxic anti-HCV agent reducing viral production by inhibiting both NS3 and heat shock proteins essential for HCV replication(1).

2. Cinnamon
In the study to investigate the bioactive phytochemicals of leaf essential oils of Cinnamomum osmophloeum on lipopolysaccharide/D-galactosamine (LPS/D-GalN)-induced acute hepatitis, found that  post-treatment with 100 μmol/kg trans-cinnamaldehyde, (-)-aromadendrene, T-cadinol, or α-cadinol significantly decreased the aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α), and interleukin 6 (IL-6) levels in serum. Moreover, both T-cadinol and α-cadinol treatments decreased the expressions of cleaved caspase-3 and cleaved poly-ADP ribose polymerase (PARP) in the liver tissues when compared with the LPS/D-GalN group(2).

3. Skin and seed of grape and red wine
Resveratrol (RES), a well-known antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compound is associated of reduced risk of chronic liver diseases, researchers at the Ohio Universities Colleges of Medicine and Pharmacy indicated that enhancement of the dissolution of RES through a nanoparticle engineering process can result in increased hepatoprotective effects mediated by antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities. Consequently, we suggest that RESN deserves further study, perhaps in prophylaxis of chronic liver diseases(3).

4. Turmeric
Curcumin has not only shown anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant, antifungal, antibacterial and anticancer activities but also has had the ability to inhibit several factors like nuclear factor-kappaB, which modulates several pro-inflammatory and profibrotic cytokines as well as its anti-oxidant properties, provide a rational molecular basis to use it in hepatic disorders. Curcumin attenuates liver injury induced by ethanol, thioacetamide, iron overdose, cholestasis and acute, subchronic and chronic carbon tetrachloride (CCl(4)) intoxication; moreover, it reverses CCl(4) cirrhosis to some extent(4).

5. Etc.

Sources
(1) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22239530
(2) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21699244
(3) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19910122
(4) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19811613

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