Chronic Inflammatory Diseases: Progress and Prospect with Herbal Medicine

Diseases associated with chronic inflammatory pathology claim a major share of worldwide deaths each year. A principal reason behind the huge number of casualties is associated with mild or unnoticed symptoms for long period of time since the outset, and that specific treatment options for these diseases have not yet emerged. Current anti-inflammatory drugs essentially have become ineffective for long term protection from these diseases as they also interfere with essential cellular pathways and associated toxicities. Notably, recent studies with a number of phytochemicals have shown promising results. These compounds isolated from various medicinal plants express their anti-inflammatory activities by down regulating expression of several crucial pro-inflammatory mediators. These are mostly antioxidants; inhibit induction of key transcription factors like nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) that are responsible for expression of proinflammatory mediators, and other growth regulators. Definitely, some of these compounds have the potential to be developed into new therapeutic agents to better control inflammation associated diseases in near future. This review summarizes recent findings on the molecular mechanisms through which various inflammatory activities are linked to disease progression and a group of natural products that have shown promise in controlling these processes.