Medicinal Plants for the Treatment of Mental Diseases in Pregnancy: An In Vitro Safety Assessment

Spiess, Deborah; Winker, Moritz; Chauveau, Antoine; Abegg, Vanessa Fabienne; Potterat, Olivier; Hamburger, Matthias; Gründemann, Carsten; Simões-Wüst, Ana Paula

doi:10.1055/a-1628-8132

Cited by 8 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 35 publications

(44 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…How much protopine is present in commercially available preparations from California poppy is also unknown and requires further clarification. Our previous ( Spiess et al, 2021 ) and current in vitro contributions to the study of California Poppy (and protopine) would be in line with a good safety profile.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 62%

“…Importantly, no explicit pathway was overly involved. Lavender oil was also highly inconspicuous in all functional assays from our previous study (Spiess et al, 2021). The same assays were now performed with linalool, one of the two major components of the essential oil.…”

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 75%

“…The hops extract was very inconspicuous in our proteomics studies, as out of a total of 3,387 proteins only one (NAGAB) was significantly upregulated. Various in vitro toxicity assays showed no negative effects either up to 30 μg/ml (cytotoxicity) or even 100 μg/ml (apoptosis, genotoxicity, metabolic activity, and influence on differentiation) ( Spiess et al, 2021 ). To our knowledge there are no concerns about a specific phytochemical from hops.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In our previous work, we conducted an initial in vitro assessment of the safety profile of extracts from St. John´s wort, California poppy, valerian, lavender, and hops. In concentrations up to 30 μg/ml, they did not possess any cytotoxic or genotoxic potential and did not compromise human placental cell viability, metabolic activity or differentiation ( Spiess et al, 2021 ). In a next step, our research goals were to 1) look for possible effects of whole extracts on gene expression and 2) use the same variety of methods as before to characterize effects of particularly relevant phytochemicals from these extracts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Katharina Gegenschatz-Schmid is gratefully acknowledged for her expertise in protein analysis and particularly for the PRIDE dataset submission support. We also acknowledge other members of the Pharmaceutical Biology group at the University of Basel, namely Orlando Fertig for performing the GC/MS analysis, Vanesssa Abegg for preparing the herbal extracts and Antoine Chauveau for characterizing them ( Spiess et al, 2021 ). Further thanks go to Dr. Tina Buerki-Thurnherr (Empa, St. Gallen) for kindly providing the BeWo cell line.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Advanced in Vitro Safety Assessment of Herbal Medicines for the Treatment of Non-Psychotic Mental Disorders in Pregnancy

et al. 2022

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

When confronted with non-psychotic mental disorders, pregnant women often refrain from using synthetic drugs and resort to herbal medicines such as St. John’s wort, California poppy, valerian, lavender, and hops. Nevertheless, these herbal medicines have not yet been officially approved in pregnancy due to lack of safety data. Using a variety of in vitro methods (determination of cytotoxicity, apoptosis induction, genotoxicity, effects on metabolic properties, and inhibition/induction of differentiation) in a commonly used placental cell line (BeWo b30), we were previously able to show that extracts from these plants are likely to be safe at the usual clinical doses. In the present work, we wanted to extend our safety assessment of these herbal medicines by 1) looking for possible effects on gene expression and 2) using the same in vitro methods to characterize effects of selected phytochemicals that might conceivably lead to safety issues. Proteomics results were promising, as none of the five extracts significantly affected protein expression by up- or down-regulation. Protopine (contained in California poppy), valerenic acid (in valerian), and linalool (in lavender) were inconspicuous in all experiments and showed no adverse effects. Hyperforin and hypericin (two constituents of St. John’s wort) and valtrate (typical for valerian) were the most obvious phytochemicals with respect to cytotoxic and apoptotic effects. A decrease in cell viability was evident with hypericin (≥1 µM) and valtrate (≥10 µM), whereas hyperforin (≥3 µM), hypericin (30 µM) and valtrate (≥10 µM) induced cell apoptosis. None of the tested phytochemicals resulted in genotoxic effects at concentrations of 0.1 and 1 µM and thus are not DNA damaging. No decrease in glucose consumption or lactate production was observed under the influence of the phytochemicals, except for valtrate (at all concentrations). No compound affected cell differentiation, except for hyperforin (≥1 µM), which had an inhibitory effect. This study suggests that extracts from St. John’s wort, California poppy, valerian, lavender, and hops are likely to be safe during pregnancy. High plasma concentrations of some relevant compounds—hyperforin and hypericin from St. John’s wort and valtrate from valerian—deserve special attention, however.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 62%

Section: Strengths and Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 75%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations