Research Article Postischemic Long-Term Treatment with Qiangli Tianma Duzhong Capsule Improves Brain Functional Recovery via the Improvement of Hemorrheology and the Inhibition of Platelet Aggregation in a Rat Model of Focal Cerebral Ischemia

Copyright © 2013 Li-Zhi Hong et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Qiangli Tianma Duzhong capsule (TMDZ), a Chinese herbal drug, is clinically used to improve functional outcome in patients with ischemic stroke in China.This study was conducted to establish whether postischemic long-term treatment with TMDZ could reduce the loss of injured hemisphere and confer the improvements of neurological outcome in chronic survival of rats with 2 h middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO)/reperfusion brain injury and its primary mechanisms. We found that TMDZ (44.5, 89, or 178mg/kg), administered per os 6 h after the onset of ischemia and for 28 consecutive days, significantly improved the behavior deficits, beginning on day 7, and further improved later. TMDZ treatment also markedly reduced the tissue loss of the injured hemisphere and improved histopathology. In the meantime, TMDZ treatment could improve hemorrheology and inhibit platelet aggregation.These results provide the first evidence that post-ischemic long-term treatment with TMDZ confers the improvements of neurological outcome and the loss of injured hemisphere in an animal ischemic stroke model, and its mechanisms might b