Phyllanthus Amarus Facilitates the Recovery of Peripheral Nerve after Injury

Problem statement: Peripheral nerve injuries are associated with morbidity and outcomes of peripheral nerve repair are poor. Moreover, it can subsequently leads to economic or social disability. Recent findings have shown that oxidative stress plays an important role on the functional recovery retardation of peripheral nerve. However, the impairment mentioned earlier is counteracted by antioxidant. Therefore, this study was carried out to determine whether the alcohol-water extract of the aerial parts of P. amarus could facilitate the functional recovery in experimental models of peripheral nerve injury induced by sciatic nerve crush injury. Approach: Male mice, weighing 30-50 g, were orally given the extract at doses of 50, 100 and 200 mg kg^-1 BW for 2 weeks before and 4 weeks after crush injury at right sciatic nerve. They were determined the recovery of nerve every 3 days using Sciatic Function Index (SFI) as an index. At the end of the experiment, the injured nerve was determined the level of Malondialdehyde (MDA) and the activities of Superoxide Disease (SOD), Glutathione Peroxidase (GPx) and Catalase (CAT) enzymes. Results: The results showed that the extract improved SFI in accompany with the enhanced CAT and the decreased MDA. However, no significant changes in SOD and GPx activities were observed. Conclusion: The results obtained from the present study suggest that P. amarus extract may enhance the recovery partly via the decreased oxidation stress. It may possibly serve as the natural resource for developing health products to facilitate the recovery of peripheral nerve injury. However, further researches about the possible active ingredient and the precise underlying mechanism are still essential.