Rheumatoid pain treated with TCM sargentodoxa cuneata

What is sargentodoxa cuneata(Hong Teng)?
Actually it refers to the dried stem of Sargentodoxa cuneata (Oliv) Rehd et Wils., a plant in the family of Lardizabalaceae. It is also commonly known as Sargentodoxae Caulis, Sargentodoxa Vine, or Sargent Glory Vine. Medicinally it is usually harvested during autumn and winter. After that, remove the lateral branches, cut into small sections, and dried.

Its plant is a deciduous woody vine, up to 10 meters. Vine Stems are glabrous, 9cm in diameter, and with dark red current-year branches and cracked old barks sometimes. Leaves are ternately compound leaf or simultaneously with single leaf. Racemes are 6 to 12cm long, with male and female flower sequence or heterologous sequence. Berry is nearly spherical, about 1cm in diameter, dark blue when ripe, and with 0.6 to 1.2cm small stalk. Seeds are ovoid, about 5 mm, and with truncate base, black bright smooth seed coat, and obvious hilum. The flowering period is from April to May and fruiting from June to September.

Sargentodoxa cuneata health benefits
Main chemical constituents are tannin, emodin, hpyscion, daucosterol, β-sitosterol, stearic acid, salidroside, and liriodendrin or d-syringaresinol bioglucosides. Next let’s see the explanation for its health benefits from its pharmacological actions.

Modern sargentodoxa vine pharmacology
1. It showed mild inhibition on isolated toad heart, manifested as decreased cardiac contractility, decreased heart rate (P <0.05), and decreased cardiac output (P <0.01); 2. It showed obvious contraction on isolated rabbit aorta; 3. It can resist potassium chloride induced contraction on isolated porcine coronary artery; 4. Its soluble extract can improve the disorder of myocardial lactate metabolism; 5. Its water-soluble extract (100mg/kg), by intravenous injection, can significantly decrease the raised ST segment on experimental myocardial infarction(MI) in rabbits; 6. Its water-soluble extract (100mg/kg) can significantly increase the cAMP of rabbit plasma;