Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2021 Oct 14;22(20):11078.
doi: 10.3390/ijms222011078.

Research Progress in Chinese Herbal Medicines for Treatment of Sepsis: Pharmacological Action, Phytochemistry, and Pharmacokinetics

Chen Cheng  1 , Xuan Yu  1
Affiliations
Review

Research Progress in Chinese Herbal Medicines for Treatment of Sepsis: Pharmacological Action, Phytochemistry, and Pharmacokinetics

Chen Cheng et al. Int J Mol Sci. .

Abstract

Sepsis is a life-threatening organ dysfunction caused by a dysregulated host response to infection; the pathophysiology of sepsis is complex. The incidence of sepsis is steadily increasing, with worldwide mortality ranging between 30% and 50%. Current treatment approaches mainly rely on the timely and appropriate administration of antimicrobials and supportive therapies, but the search for pharmacotherapies modulating the host response has been unsuccessful. Chinese herbal medicines, i.e., Chinese patent medicines, Chinese herbal prescriptions, and single Chinese herbs, play an important role in the treatment of sepsis through multicomponent, multipathway, and multitargeting abilities and have been officially recommended for the management of COVID-19. Chinese herbal medicines have therapeutic actions promising for the treatment of sepsis; basic scientific research on these medicines is increasing. However, the material bases of most Chinese herbal medicines and their underlying mechanisms of action have not yet been fully elucidated. This review summarizes the current studies of Chinese herbal medicines used for the treatment of sepsis in terms of clinical efficacy and safety, pharmacological activity, phytochemistry, bioactive constituents, mechanisms of action, and pharmacokinetics, to provide an important foundation for clarifying the pathogenesis of sepsis and developing novel antisepsis drugs based on Chinese herbal medicines.

Keywords: Chinese herbal medicines; Qingwen Baidu decoction; Shengfu injection; Shengmai; Xuanbai Chengqi decoction; XueBiJing injection; antiseptic actions; material basis; sepsis.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Chemical structures of bioactive and bioavailable herbal compounds from antisepsis Chinese herbal medicines.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Potential mechanism of antisepsis actions of the five CHM based on pathophysiologic processes involved in sepsis. The dash line arrows indicate proposed action targets or signaling pathways that the five CHM probably involve; the solid line arrows indicate cascade mechanism of pathophysiology in sepsis. CLRs, C-type lectin receptors; TLRs, toll-like receptors; NLR, nucleotide binding domain and leucine-rich-repeat-containing proteins; RLR, Retinoic acid-inducible gene-like receptors; HMGB1, high mobility group B-1; PAMPs, pathogen-associated molecular patterns; LPS, lipopolysaccharide; TNF-α, tumor necrosis factor-α; IL-1, interleukin 1; IL-1β, interleukin 1β; IL-18, interleukin 18; DAMPs, damage-associated molecular-pattern molecules.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Singer M., Deutschman C.S., Seymour C.C., Shankar-Hari M., Annane D., Bauer M., Bellomo R., Bernard G.R., Chiche J.-D., Coopersmith C.C.M., et al. The Third International Consensus Definitions for Sepsis and Septic Shock (Sepsis-3) JAMA. 2016;315:801–810. doi: 10.1001/jama.2016.0287. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Fleischmann M.C., Scherag A., Adhikari N.K.J., Hartog C.S., Tsaganos T., Schlattmann P., Angus D.C., Reinhart K., on behalf of the International Forum Acute Care Trialists Assessment of Global Incidence and Mortality of Hospital-treated Sepsis. Am. J. Respir. Crit. Care Med. 2016;193:259–272. doi: 10.1164/rccm.201504-0781OC. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Xie J., Wang H., Kang Y., Zhou L., Liu Z., Qin B., Ma X., Cao X., Chen D., Lu W., et al. The Epidemiology of Sepsis in Chinese ICUs. Crit. Care Med. 2020;48:e209–e218. doi: 10.1097/CCM.0000000000004155. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Phelan A.L., Katz R., Gostin L.O. The Novel Coronavirus Originating in Wuhan, China Challenges for Global Health Governance. JAMA. 2020;323:709. doi: 10.1001/jama.2020.1097. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Fan T.-T., Cheng B.-L., Fang X.-M., Chen Y.-C., Su F. Application of Chinese Medicine in the Management of Critical Conditions: A Review on Sepsis. Am. J. Chin. Med. 2020;48:1315–1330. doi: 10.1142/S0192415X20500640. - DOI - PubMed