
Bee venom stimulation of a lung meridian acupoint reduces inflammation in carrageenan-induced pleurisy
an alternative therapeutic approach for respiratory inflammation
- Hoon-Seong Choi Suk-Yun Kang Dae-Hyun Roh Sheu-Ran Choi Yeonhee Ryu Jang-Hern Lee
- 대한수의학회
- Journal of Veterinary Science
- 제19권 제5호
- 등재여부 : KCI등재
- 2018.09
- 708 - 715 (8 pages)
Respiratory inflammation is a frequent and fatal pathologic state encountered in veterinary medicine. Although diluted bee venom (dBV) has potent anti-inflammatory effects, the clinical use of dBV is limited to several chronic inflammatory diseases. The present study was designed to propose an acupoint dBV treatment as a novel therapeutic strategy for respiratory inflammatory disease. Experimental pleurisy was induced by injection of carrageenan into the left pleural space in mouse. The dBV was injected into a specific lung meridian acupoint (LU-5) or into an arbitrary non-acupoint located near the midline of the back in mouse. The inflammatory responses were evaluated by analyzing inflammatory indicators in pleural exudate. The dBV injection into the LU-5 acupoint significantly suppressed the carrageenan-induced increase of pleural exudate volume, leukocyte accumulation, and myeloperoxidase activity. Moreover, dBV acupoint treatment effectively inhibited the production of interleukin 1 beta, but not tumor necrosis factor alpha in the pleural exudate. On the other hand, dBV treatment at non-acupoint did not inhibit the inflammatory responses in carrageenan-induced pleurisy. The present results demonstrate that dBV stimulation in the LU-5 lung meridian acupoint can produce significant anti-inflammatory effects on carrageenan-induced pleurisy suggesting that dBV acupuncture may be a promising alternative medicine therapy for respiratory inflammatory diseases.
Introduction
Materials and Methods
Results
Discussion