Pregnancy outcomes, embryonic and fetal development in maternal exposure to Chinese medicines.

Chinese medicine is a common name for a collection of Chinese Materia Medica with therapeutic properties for medical treatment and healing. Similar to Western pharmaceuticals, Chinese medicines are not free of risk, and have the potential to cause adverse pregnancy outcomes and affect embryonic and fetal development. However, most clinical data concerning safety of maternal exposure to Chinese medicines during pregnancy are not available and the conclusion remains elusive. Some individual clinical trials of Chinese medicines reported some minor adverse effects during pregnancy, whereas few animal studies identified some adverse maternal and perinatal effects, as well as embryotoxic potentials. Basic research and mechanistic studies of the teratogenicity of Chinese medicines are still lacking. There is an urgent need for testing the safety of Chinese medicines before recommendation and commercialization. Until more reliable and scientific research data become available, clinicians should consider both the risks and benefits before recommending Chinese medicines to pregnant women. More systematic investigations of the safety implications of the use of Chinese medicines are highly recommended, in addition to more clinical trials with a larger sample size to confirm its safety during pregnancy. This review includes a critical overview of available clinical and experimental data and provides directions to study the safety issue of Chinese medicines for pregnancy.

Black blood T1rho MR imaging may diagnose early stage liver fibrosis: a proof-of-principle study with rat biliary duct ligation model.

BACKGROUND: To explore black blood T1rho (T1ρ) liver imaging and investigate the earliest stage when biliary duct ligation (BDL) induced liver fibrosis can be diagnosed. METHODS: MR was performed at 3 Tesla. A T1ρ prepared 2D fast spin echo (FSE) sequence with acquisition of four spin lock times (TSLs: 1, 10, 30, and 50 msec) and spin-lock frequency of 500 Hz was applied. Inherent black blood effect of FSE and double inversion recovery (DIR) achieved blood signal suppression, and 3 axial sections per liver were obtained. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were scanned at baseline (n=32), and on day-3 (n=13), day-5 (n=11), day-7 (n=10), day-10 (n=4) respectively after BDL. Hematoxylin-eosin (HE) and picrosirius red staining liver histology was obtained at these time points. RESULTS: The physiological liver parenchyma T1ρ was 38.38±1.53 msec (range, 36.05-41.53 msec). Liver T1ρ value elevated progressively after BDL. On day-10 after BDL all experimental animals can be separated from normal liver based on T1ρ measurement with lowest value being 42.82 msec. Day-7 and day-10 liver resembled METAVIR stage-F1/F2 fibrosis, and fibrous area counted for 0.22%±0.13% and 0.38%±0.44% of liver parenchyma area, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides the first proof-of-principle that T1ρ might diagnose early stage liver fibrosis.

Pro-bone and antifat effects of green tea and its polyphenol, epigallocatechin, in rat mesenchymal stem cells in vitro.

Green tea has been demonstrated recently as a potent bone supportive agent. Our previous studies showed that green tea and its polyphenolic constituents can promote bone-forming osteoblast activities and inhibit the bone-resorpting osteoclast formation. The objective of the present study was to investigate whether green tea and its components can regulate the osteogenic and adipogenic differentiation in pluripotent rat mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). The rat MSCs were isolated from the bone marrow of tibiae and femora. The cells were treated with decaffeinated green tea extract (GTE) and six tea polyphenols under osteogenic induction. The alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activities and matrix calcium (Ca) deposition were assessed after 7 and 14 days of treatment. Our results demonstrated that GTE could significantly increase ALP dose dependently in the concentrations without cytotoxicity (0-100 µg/mL). Among six tested tea polyphenols, epigallocatechin (EGC) was shown to be the most effective in promoting osteogenic differentiation. At 20 µM, EGC increased ALP levels and Ca deposition significantly by 2.3- and 1.7-fold, respectively, when compared with the control group. EGC also increased the mRNA expression of bone formation markers runt-related transcription factor 2, ALP, osteonectin, and osteopontin. Furthermore, EGC demonstrated its antiadipogenicity by decreasing the adipocyte formation and inhibiting the mRNA expression levels of the adipogenic markers peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ, ccaat/enhancer-binding protein ß, and fatty acid binding protein 4. In conclusion, this is the first report of the dual action of green tea polyphenol EGC in promoting osteogenesis and inhibiting adipocyte formation in MSCs. Our results provide scientific evidence to support the potential use of green tea in supporting the bone against degenerative diseases such as osteoporosis.