Antifibrotic effects of a herbal combination regimen on hepatic fibrotic rats

Liver fibrosis has been characterized as chronic inflammatory processes involving multiple molecular pathogenetic pathways. This therapeutic study investigated whether a combination regimen of Salvia miltiorrhiza (S), Ligusticum chuanxiong (L) and Glycyrrhiza glabra (G) exerted in vivo antifibrotic effects on rats with hepatic fibrosis. Fibrosis was induced in rats by dimethylnitrosamine (DMN) administration for 4 weeks. Fibrotic rats were randomly assigned to one of the three groups: control, SLG (50 mg/kg) or silymarin (50 mg/kg), each given by gavage twice daily for 3 weeks starting 1 week after DMN injection. The results showed that fibrosis scores of livers from DMN-treated rats with SLG (1.13 +/- 0.13) were significantly reduced in comparison with DMN-treated rats receiving vehicle (1.63 +/- 0.18). Moreover, the hepatic collagen content of DMN rats was significantly reduced by either SLG or silymarin treatment. The double immunohistochemical staining results also showed that alpha-SMA positive cells with NF kappa B nuclear translocation were decreased in the fibrotic livers by SLG and silymarin treatments. The mRNA expression levels of TGF-beta1, alpha-SMA, collagen1 alpha 2, iNOS and ICAM-1 genes were attenuated by SLG and silymarin treatment. The results showed that SLG exerted antifibrotic effects in rats with DMN-induced hepatic fibrosis.