Medicinal plants in the prevention and treatment of rheumatoid arthritis

Abstract

Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic, inflammatory disorder that may affect many tissues and organs, but principally attacks flexible (synovial) joints. The process produces an inflammatory responses of the capsule around the joints, secondary swelling of the synovial cells. The aim in this review is to collate all available data on experiments reporting the anti-arthritic effect of plants and natural products in the last two decades. A bibliographic investigation was carried out by analyzing recognized books and peerreviewed papers, consulting worldwide accepted scientific databases (Scirus, Embase, HighWire, MEDLINE/PubMed, Science Direct, Google Scholar). We used medical subject heading terms and the words "Anti-arthritic", "Bone disease", "Medicinal Plants", to identify relevant articles. In the present study, interest is focused on experimental research conducted on medicinal plants, particularly those which show anti-arthritic activities alongside bioactive components. A total of 11 plant species have been identified as active or promising sources of phytochemicals with antiarthritic properties.