Romanian Society of Pharmaceutical Sciences

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EXPLORING THE AMELIORATIVE EFFECTS OF HYPERICUM SCABRUM L. ON A SURGICALLY-INDUCED ENDOMETRIOSIS RAT MODEL AND ITS PHYTOCHEMICAL PROFILING BY LC-MS/MS

MERT ILHAN 1,2*, ABDULHAMIT BATTAL 3, BURAK KAPTANER 4, ABDULAHAD DOGAN 5, FATIH DONMEZ 5, MUSTAFA ABDULLAH YILMAZ 6, HUSEYIN EROGLU 4

1Department of Pharmacognosy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Düzce University, 81620, Düzce, Türkiye
2Department of Pharmacognosy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Van Yüzüncü Yıl University, 65080, Tusba, Van, Türkiye
3Department of Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, Faculty of Pharmacy, Van Yüzüncü Yıl University, 65080, Tusba, Van, Türkiye
4Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Van Yüzüncü Yıl University, 65080, Tusba, Van, Türkiye
5Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Van Yüzüncü Yıl University, 65080, Tusba, Van, Türkiye
6Department of Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Dicle University, 21280, Diyarbakır, Türkiye

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Endometriosis is described as the existence and expansion of functional endometrial-like tissues in another part of the uterine cavity. It affects not only postmenopausal women but also teenagers after menarche, causing subfertility, dysmenorrhea and severe pelvic pain. Since no specific treatment is acknowledged for this disease, the present study aimed to investigate the efficacy of H. scabrum in a surgically-induced endometriosis rat model. In order to test the efficacy of H. scabrum on endometriosis, n-hexane, ethyl acetate (EtOAc), methanol (MeOH) and aqueous extracts were prepared from the aerial parts of H. scabrum. The cytokine levels, antioxidant enzyme activities, the contents of malondialdehyde (MDA) and glutathione (GSH) and histopathological analyses were evaluated. In order to reveal the potential active compounds, liquid chromatography-mass/mass spectroscopy (LC-MS/MS) analysis was performed on the MeOH extract who presented the highest activity. The MeOH extract significantly decreased the adhesion scores, endometriotic implant volumes, cytokine levels and the antioxidant parameters. Furthermore, histological procedures supported those findings. According to LC-MS/MS analysis of the MeOH extract, the major compounds were mostly phenolic acids and flavonoids. We concluded that the MeOH extract from H. scabrum aerial parts could be used for the treatment of endometriosis, and its activity could be attributed to the chlorogenic acid and quercetin, detected in the highest amounts.