[Protective effects of ginsenosides on warm ischemic damages of the rabbit kidney]

Renal function and morphology were studied before and after 60 min of renal ischemia and contralateral nephrectomy in two groups of rabbits. The animals were pretreated with ginsenosides (n = 22) and saline (n = 22) respectively, the latter as control. Results showed that ginsenosides (30 mg/kg body wt.) pretreatment by intravenous injection 10 min before warm ischemia resulted in the survival of all the animals with better renal function, 1, 3 and 7 days after blood urea nitrogen, fraction of excreted sodium and urine protein were observed in the control rabbits and a less pronounced increase was noted (P less than 0.05) after pretreatment with ginsenosides. The appearance of kidney tissue taken from surviving rabbits with Ginsenosides pretreatment was found to be normal under light microscope. Severe tubular necrosis was observed in kidneys of the control group. Tissues were examined with a transmission electron microscope. ginsenosides have protective effects on the epithelial cells of the proximal convoluted tubules, and microvilli and mitochondria were less damaged by ischemia than those of the control animals. There was also a large amount of ribosome on rough surfaced endoplasmic reticulum in the cells of ginsenosides-treated kidney, reflecting their ability to stimulate ribonucleic acid and protein synthesis. This is considered to be the basis of improvement of renal function.