Sho-saiko-to

Encyclopedia : S : SH : SHO : Sho-saiko-to

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Sho-saiko-to (SST, TJ-9, [H09], [Liver Kampo]), also known as Minor Bupleurum Formula or Xiao Chai Hu Tang, has been used extensively in China and in Japan to treat chronic liver disease and other inflammatory diseases. The seven-herb formulation was first described in the ancient Chinese classical textbook, Shang Han Lun, written by Zhang Zhong Jing in Han Dynasty (around 200A.D., English translation: “Shang Han Lun: On Cold Damage, Translation & Commentaries”by Craig Mitchell et al). In China, this herbal formula has been used widely in a diagnostic stage, in Chinese medicine term, "shao yang" etiologies, which include many Western diseases such as digestive diseases and chronic liver disease.

Chinese medicine was brought into Japan through Korea around 600 A.D. and consequently through the Japanese Buddhist priests who learned the medicine in China in Nara Era (710-794 A.D.)12. SST was only one of many classical herbal formulas used by several herbal medicine schools in Japan. Throughout the ancient history, Japanese Kampo was developed under the influence of Chinese medicine with emphasis of local practice. In the 1970’s, the Japanese Ministry of Health and Welfare has approved the herbal formula as one of the first few ethic drugs under prescription by physicians and pharmacists. The national health insurance reimburses the approved herbal formulas. By the end of last century, an estimated 1.5 million hepatitis patients have used SST in Japan.

SST is the most extensively researched Chinese herbal formula in the Japanese scientific and pharmaceutical communities during the past decades. Besides a large body of publications in Japanese language, there have been over 100 English publications on SST documenting its anti-inflammative, antifibrosis, and chemopreventive effects that may be the foundations of therapeutic benefits for chronic liver disease.

SST is composed of Bupleurum root (Bupleurum chinese), Pinellia tuber (Pinellia ternata), Baical Skullcap root (Scutellaria baicalensi), Ginseng root (Panax ginseng), Licorice root (Glycyrrhiza uralensi), Ginger rhizome (Zingiber officinale), and Jujube fruit (Zizyphus jujuba). Individual components have been indicated for preventing hepatic fibrosis. For example, glycyrrhizin, a triterpenoid saponin extract from licorice root, displays in vitro and in vivo ability to reduce serum aminotransferases and improve hepatic fibrosis. Baicalein, a major flavonoid in Scutellaria, has antiproliferative and anti fibrogenic effects when tested in hepatic stellate cells from rats in vitro. Baicalin, another flavonoid in Scutellaria, induces apoptosis via mitochondrial pathway in a leukemia-derived T cell line but shows little toxic effect on peripheral blood mononuclear cells from healthy volunteers, which in turn inhibits the growth of cancer cells.

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