Pharmacological Effects of Traditional Chinese Medicine on Cardiovascular Disease

Cardiovascular diseases include ischemic and hemorrhagic diseases involving the heart, brain, whole body tissue, and includes coronary heart disease, heart failure, arrhythmia, atherosclerosis and stroke. This particular group of diseases continue to be a leading cause of death throughout the world with mortality rate remaining high. Currently, drugs administered orally and intravenously and surgical treatments are used to treat such diseases. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) refers to natural herbal medicines and their processed products used for preventing and treating disease under the guidance of traditional Chinese medicine’s theory. The implementation of prevention and treatment programs of ischemic cardiovascular diseases with the use of TCM have been associated with positive outcomes; in terms of a reduction in the disability and mortality rate of some patients. Other studies have also shown that specific multi-component TCM preparations have therapeutic benefits based on multi-target and multi-pathway mechanisms, which may have advantages over the current single-component and single-target therapy. Based these characteristics, approved pharmaceutical drugs based in TCM, such as Compound Danshen Dripping Pills, Naoxintong Capsules, Tonxinluo Capsules, and Danhong Injection, are currently used to treat cardiovascular diseases. However, there are a number of areas that still need further investigation. For example, the identification of effective components in herbal medicine is essential in furthering our understanding of what occurs at a pharmacological level; the metabolizing pharmacological pathways of such components; the cellular target of the components; and the lack of standardized guidelines to enhance clinical research.