Abstract

One of the reasons for the failures of treatments for diabetes mellitus in African medicine is the lack of knowledge of the different types of diabetes and the existence of the mechanisms of action of plant extracts or their secondary metabolites responsible for antihyperglycemic activities, called active ingredients. The different types of diabetes are not taken into account by local therapists. The present work investigates the pathways of action of herbal products and secondary metabolites necessary for the management of diabetes. To achieve this objective previous article were searching systematically using “herbal products and secondary metabolites necessary for the management of diabetes” as engine to access Google, PubMed and Google scholar databases. All the relevant articles, published in English language between 1914 and 2018 were collected for widespread review. The mechanisms of action of the active compounds like charantin, momordicoside S and its aglycones momordicosides, polypeptide-p, vicine, and momordin, in herbal medicines with relevance to their glucose-lowering identified are: inhibition of intestinal absorption of glucose, suppression key glycogenic enzymes, decreased hepatic gluconeogenesis, AMP-activated protein kinase activator, reduced expression Phosphoenolpyruvate Carboxykinase, reduced glucose and lipids and upregulation of insulin signaling pathway-associated proteins. This knowledge is of extreme importance in order to establish the best possible herbal treatments of diabetes.

Keywords: Type 1;Type 2 diabetes mellitus;Gestational diabetes;Antidiabetic activity;Herbal medicines;Previous mechanisms of action

Abbreviations: PEPCK: Phosphoenolpyruvate Carboxykinase; HCS:Human Chorionic Somatomammotropin; NAFLD: Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease; AMPK: Adenosine Monophosphate-Activated Protein Kinase