The protective role of Hypericum perforatum in treatment of oxidative stress-induced multiple sclerosis is affected by extraction procedure: A literature review

Incidence of multiple sclerosis (MS) is increasing over all the world, because effective treatment of the disease has not been discovered yet. In the treatment of MS, different inflammatory chemical drugs have been used, but they have adverse effects on the normal cells and neurons, although plant extracts including Hypericum perforatum has no adverse effects on the normal cells in human. Oxidative stress induced excessive production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and ROS production occurs during the several physiological and pathophysiological functions. Hypericum perforatum known as St. John’s Wort, has been proven to relieve in depression. However, results of recent studies reported modulator role of Hypericum perforatum on MS in rats (Nazıroğlu et al. 2014). The cellular and molecular mechanisms that underlie the effects of the Hypericum perforatum on MS pain pathways are not known, results in the literature suggest that the modulator effects of Hypericum perforatum in MS could be related to an increase antioxidant effect (Mojaverrostami et al. 2018). Recently, modulator roles of plant extracts such as Hypericum perforatum and through inhibition of ROS production in the treatment of MS have been reported. However, antioxidant contents of the plant extracts were affected by several factors, including extraction procedures (Dresler et al. 2018). In the presentation, I will review current data on the extraction procedures of Hypericum perforatum. In addition, I will summarize recent data on therapeutic roles of Hypericum perforatum in MS. In conclusion, it seems that Hypericum perforatum has potential therapeutic effects against MS-induced oxidative stress.