Treatment of Suqingwan watered pill reduces colon injury induced by experimental colitis

Ethnopharmacological relevance: Sunqingwan watered pill (SWP) is a Chinese medicine compound, traditionally used in the treating UC symptoms like diarrhea, bloody and purulent stool, abdominal pain, etc. The present study aim to examine the effects of SWP on ulcerative colitis using the modern pharmacological models. Materials and methods: To address this question, we used two experimental models of colitis, mice induced by dextran sulfate sodium (DSS) as well as rats induced by 2,4-dinitrochlorobenzene (DNCB). For the mice with DSS-induced colitis, the disease activity index (DAI) and colon histological injuries were observed. For the rat models with DNCB-induced colitis, DAI, levels of nitric oxide (NO) in serum, macroscopic and histological colon injury were investigated. Besides, we also introduced a usually used model of ear swelling induced by xylene in mice to reveal the effect of SWP on acute inflammation. Result: In the mice with DSS-induced colitis and the rats with DNCB-induced colitis, SWP could significantly decreased the DAI scores, which meant the body weights of animals were recovered and the gross rectal bleeding reduced. Under the microscope, the histology of colon was obviously changed in SWP administration groups. In the rat models with DNCB-induced colitis, SWP also significantly attenuated macroscopic and colon histological injury. The colon scores in SWP groups in rats was obviously lower than those in the control and similarly the serum levels of NO in the treatment groups were significantly lower than that of control group except for low dosage group of SWP. SWP with the dosages of 1.755 and 3.510 g/kg could inhibit the degree of ear swelling significantly compared with the blank control group (p < 0.01), showing it owned good anti-inflammatory activity after 14 days administration. Conclusion: SWP is effective on treating UC, especially at the high dose and the mechanism may be related with adjusting the serum level of NO, inhibiting colonic mucosa damage and promoting ulcer repair. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.