The Use of Plants in the Practice of Medicine through History

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The Use of Plants in the Practice of Medicine
through History

• Ralph N. Blomster, Ph. D.
• Professor Emeritus

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History of Plant Use lie in Antiquity

• From the dawn of time man experimented with many
  substances for the treatment of disease. The most
  common and simplest were the large number of
  plants available
• They were used by ancient civilization i.e
• Chinese, Hindu, Mayan, Egyptian and Mediterranean
  peoples
• From 3000 B.C. to ca. 1840 A.D. plants were used
  directly or as extracts,as the only means of
  Pharmacotherapy

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Plants were used for other purposes prior to
their medicinal use.

• Arrow Poisons Chondodendron Bark (curarae a
  muscle relaxant) and Strophanthus (ouabain a
  deadly cardiac steroid)
• For religious or other rituals ie. Trials
  Physostigma venosa (Calabar or ordeal bean)
  Physostigmine in ophthomology for miosis to lower
  intraocular pressure.
• Belladonna by the oracle of Apollo. Hallucinogen
• As cosmetics (Belladonna and Datura), pupil
  dilation
• As sorcerers drugs Hallucinogens and
  divination

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Most Plants were discovered by trial and errror

• Plants were picked at random to treat a disease
  or they resembled another plant and when it was
  used it showed a different action or it was
  poisonous and when used in small amounts had a
  medicinal effect.
• Some were used because they resembled a body
  organ or mimicked a disease state. This was known
  as the Doctrine of Signatures

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Sanguanaria Snake root
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Liverwort
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• However after periods of time the plants were
  codified and put into Pharmacopoeias
• Ebers Papyrus Egyptian Pharmacopoeia
• Emperor Shen Nung Pharmacopoeia .
• Arabs Poppy juice 3rd century B.C.Colchicum
  6th century A.D

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Emperor Shen Nung 2735 B.C.

• Described an antifebrile Chang Shang. It was
  used to treat fevers Malaria etc. Recently
  artemesian was isolated
• Listed toad skins for heart conditions, action
  similar to Digitalis cardiac glycosides
• Described the diaphoretic and stimulative
  activity of Ma Haung. Ephedra sinica. 5000 years
  later Nagi isolated ephedrine in 1887 as the d,l
  mixture

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Ma Haung

• After isolation of ephedrine, it was introduced
  into western medicine (ca. 1925) by K.K. Chen. He
  showed the relationship to adrenaline.
• Used for the treatment of bronchial asthma, hay
  fever and other allergic conditions.
• Shortage led to synthetic compounds,earliest was
  amphetamine. It is related to other
  phenethylamimes, i.e. mescaline from Peyote and
  Cathine from Khat (Catha edulis)

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Ephedra Alkaloid Activity

• CNS stimulation
• Bronchodilation
• Cardiac stimulation
• Tachycardia
• Diuretic
• Increases both systolic and diastolic pressure

• Peripheral vasoconstriction
• Elevation of bp
• Decrease in intestinal motility and tone
• Stimulates uterine contraction

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Ebers Papyrus 1500 B.C.

• White Squill action on heart similar to
  digitalis, but more powerful, unfortunately toxic
  dose easily reached. Similar compounds are found
  in related Red Squill which is used as a
  rodenticide
• Ipecac Cephaelis ipecacuanha. Several alkaloids
  of medicinal value, mainly emetine Used to treat
  amoebic dysentary. Whole plant preparations used
  as expectorants and as emetic and diaphoretic

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Other plants used by Ancient Peoples

• Incas
• Used Erythroxylon coca for ability to provide
  stimulant activity
• In 1860 cocaine was isolated from it and 24 years
  later it became a local anesthetic for
  otolaryngologists

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• Native Americans
• Mayapple Podophyllum peltatum,- used for cancer
  and skin conditions, a purgative and anthelmetic.
• The dried resin (Podophyllin) used as an
  escarotic to remove superficial skin
  products.Veneral warts

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Isolation of Seconday Constituents

• From the late 1800s many of the medicinal plants
  were subjected to processes to isolate the active
  compounds.
• The first important drugs were alkaloids
  morphine (1806), Atropine (1833) and quinine
  (1823)
• From that period on large numbers of various
  compounds have been isolated from plants. Their
  structure determined and synthesis of similar
  compounds accomplished

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Factors Impinging on Drug Studies

• Pasteur and the development of the theory of
  disease. Postulated that disease was caused by
  microbes and should be able ameliorate disease.
• Developed the theory of sepsis and antisepsis.

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• Paul Ehrlich proposed that chemo- therapeutic
  agents were bound to receptors in mammalian
  cells. Said that antigens and chemotherapeutic
  agents had haptophore (anchoring groups) and
  toxiphore (poisonous) groups. He said that
  chemotherapeutic agents were bound to receptors
  by ordinary chemical reactions.

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Golden Age of Medicinal Chemistry

• Ehrlich used this to propose synthetic process to
  provide drugs to attack receptor. Could provide a
  Magic Bullet In 1910 developed salvarsan an
  organic arsenical to treat syphilis only five
  years after the organism was isolated.

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• In the early 1900s the German dye industry
  produced a large number of anti-parasite drugs
  and sulfonamide type antibiotics
• 1940 through 1960s saw thousands of compounds
  being synthesized, empirically, in many instances
  with minor structural changes. The Thalidomide
  birth defects caused a change in procedures.
• Since then we have developed more directed
  syntheses and programs