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Gegen: Traditional Uses and Potential Medicinal Benefits in Diabetes and Cardiovascular Diseases 2
Puerarin is the major boiactive constituents in Gegen. In clinical application, there are three main dosage forms, including injection, capsule and tablet. Injection is used widely in China for the treatment of coronary heart disease, angina pectoris, cardiac infarction, obstruction of retinal artery and vein, sudden deafness, cerebrovascular diseases, viral myocarditis and diabetes.
Pharmacological Actions of Gegen
Effects on the cardiovascular system
Gegen is often included as an essential herb ingredient in TCM formulae for treating cardiovascular diseases such as hypertension. It is believed that the major isoflavone puerarin is responsible for its pharmacological actions on the cardiovascular systems, which has been demonstrated in several cell culture and animal models of cardiovascular disorders.
Effects on diabetes and diabetic complications
Currently, the control and treatment of diabetes and its complications mainly depend on pharmaceutical interventions. Gegen has been used in TCM for the management of diabetes for thousands of years, and accumulating evidence has supported that Gegen extract and its major constituent isoflavonoids, in particular puerarin, confers anti-diabetic effects in various animal and cell models.
A.Anti-diabetes
Recent studies demonstrated that Gegen extract and puerarin could restore the pathological abnormalities induced by high glucose levels in vitro and in vivo. In high glucose-treated preadipocytes, co-incubation of puerarin considerably potentiated the glucose uptake in a dose-dependent manner.
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