キドウ エンショウ チリョウヤク ノ タンサク ト ソノ ヤクリガクテキ トクセイ ニカンスル ケンキュウ : カンポウヤク オヨビ グリチルリチン ノ グルココルチコイドヨウ イデンシ ハツゲン チョウセツ サヨウ

Chronic inflammatory respiratory diseases, such as chronic obstructive pulmonarydiseases (COPD) are characterized by neutrophilia in the bronchoalveolar lavage fluid(BALF) as well as by an increase of neutrophil chemoatractants, such as interleukin(IL)-8. It is commonly believed that the treatment of the neutrophil-dependentinflammation must be the most important to prevent the progression of these diseases.However, the cellular inflammation or increased protease burden in COPD is ofteninsensitive to glucocorticoid, which is the most useful drug to treat other inflammatorylung diseases, such as asthma. In addition, prolonged treatment of glucocorticoid causessevere side effects even in glucocorticoid-sensitive patients. Therefore, there are only afew therapeutic drugs for treatment of these diseases. On the other hand, clinical usageof traditional herbal medicines for chronic diseases has been increasing. Herbalmedicines tend to have minor side effects and sometimes produce remarkable efficacyon airway inflammation. Therefore, the first part of this study was designed to evaluatethe anti-inflammatory effect of Hochu-ekki-to in neutrophil-dependent lunginflammation, using SO2 gas-exposed rats, and to examine the mechanism ofanti-inflammatory effect of Hochu-ekki-to with in vitro experiments. Then I havecharacterized the regulatory effect of glycyrrhizin (GL), an active component ofHochu-ekki-to, on IL-8 gene expression, comparing that of dexamethasone (DEX)