A review on medicinal plants used as anti-inflammatory agents

Abstract

Medicinal plants are gaining much interest recently because their use in ethno medicine treating common diseases such as cold, fever, diarrhoea, cough and other medicinal claims are now supported with sound scientific evidences. Several plants with various properties have been mentioned earlier in the oldest Indian mythology Rigveda and Ayurveda, thus the use of medicinal plants in India dates back to 3500-1800 B.C. The inflammatory process may be defined as a sequence of events that occur in response to noxious stimuli, infection or trauma. Medicinal plants are used over the use of Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS). The main factor that limits the use NSAIDs is their gastrointestinal toxicity. The present review gives an introduction to some medicinal plants having anti-inflammatory activity, botanical name, plant family along with their common name, parts used, plant constituents, action/uses.