Ginseng shows potential as Parkinson's treatment

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http://www.medicalpost.com/mpcontent/article.jsp?content=20040808_170758_5120

 

Ginseng shows potential as Parkinson's treatment

 

By Donalee Moulton

 

HALIFAX – The ancient Chinese believed ginseng could

help treat everything from lung ailments to stomach

problems to psychiatric conditions. Now a thoroughly

modern 21st-century researcher says the perennial herb

may well be an effective treatment for Parkinson's

disease.

 

Dr. Harold Robertson was skeptical when first

approached by two members of his lab interested in

exploring the use of ginseng as a possible means of

replacing dopamine cells in patients with Parkinson's

disease.

 

" I wasn't really sure it was going to have any effect

at all, (but) I let them play, " the head of the

department of pharmacology at Dalhousie University

said. However, " When I saw the results, I was

convinced. "

 

In the first study conducted by Dr. Robertson and his

colleagues, some rats were given a commercial

preparation of ginseng in their drinking water.

 

Others received only plain water. The rats were then

injected with MPP+, a drug that induces Parkinson's

disease. The drug has become a reliable model for

Parkinson's disease since it gained notoriety in the

1980s following an outbreak of PD among drug addicts

in California. The addicts had been trying to

synthesize Demerol, but instead came up with a

precursor of MPP+. Virtually everyone who injected

this drug developed Parkinson's disease.

 

A number of behavioural results are associated with

MPP+. In rats who had been sipping on ginseng, these

results failed to occur. Further exploration found

that the dopamine neurons in animals injected only

with MPP+ were dead. Surprisingly, in animals that had

received ginseng, virtually 100% of the neurons were

alive, said Dr. Robertson.

 

The research, first published in Experimental

Neurology, was then replicated in mice, and the same

effects were discovered. " This is evidence that it

would work in vivo, " said Dr. Robertson, whose

research interests are in the area of gene expression

in long-term changes in the brain and dopaminergic

neurotransmission.

 

" The literature suggests that ginseng is protective of

neurons, " he noted, " but the exciting thing to me is

that we're giving this orally. "

 

The Dalhousie team, which also includes Dr. Bob

Drobitch, a member of the College of Pharmacy at

Dalhousie and Dr. Jackalina Van Kampen, a postdoctoral

fellow in Dr. Robertson's lab, found that the

protective effects of ginseng lasted for about 48

hours.

 

The implications for treating patients is significant,

noted Dr. Robertson. " When we first diagnose patients

with Parkinson's disease most people aren't very ill

with the disease. They have a lot of healthy neurons

left. If we could start treating people as soon as

they are diagnosed, we could stop the process.

 

" We believe ginseng has the potential to do this, " he

added. " We would effectively have a cure for the

disease. "

 

Dr. Robertson is not advocating those with Parkinson's

begin consuming large quantities of ginseng. Indeed,

more research is needed and he is now exploring the

possibility of doing a limited clinical trial. " It

requires almost nothing to set up, " he said. " There

are no really serious side-effects. "