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History

It has been more than 30?years since the chemical composition of Gastrodia elata was analyzed. It includes phenols, organic acids, sterols, and so on. At present, the studies of the composition of Gastrodia elata focus on the fingerprint, but the studies of gastrodin were centered on the activity. The studies showed that gastrodin has many pharmacological effects with safety and few side effects; moreover, it is not easy to accumulate in the body. Based on traditional medicinal experience of Gastrodia elata, gastrodin has been developed as a medicine for the treatment of insomnia, headaches, and other symptoms related to the functions and indications of Gastrodia elata. At present, many pharmaceutical factories in China have produced active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) and general preparation of gastrodin, such as Gastrodia tablet, Gastrodia capsule, and Gastrodia injection. To reduce the frequency of administration, the fluctuations of blood drug concentration, as well as side effects, some new dosage forms have been developed in recent years, such as Gastrodia dispersible tablets, Gastrodia sustained-release tablet, sustained-release pellets and osmotic pump tablets, etc. . Although gastrodin has been applied clinically, a lot of studies still need to be done to confirm the pharmacological effects of gastrodin. Recent studies found that other compositions of Gastrodia elata also showed rather excellent biological activity, suggesting that the study of Gastrodia elata and gastrodin needs further investigation.

Indications

Gastrodin is included in the International Pharmacopoeia (5th ed.). The dosage forms include injections, tablets, and capsules. They are widely used for the treatment of vertigo (Meniere’s disease, medicinal dizziness, traumatic vertigo, sudden deafness, vestibular neuronitis, vertebrobasilar insufficiency, etc.), headache (vascular headache, migraine, etc.), neuralgia (trigeminal neuralgia, sciatica, etc.), neurasthenia syndrome, and brain traumatic syndrome .

Pharmacology

Gastrodin has the pharmacological effects of hypnosis, sedation, and anticonvulsive. The pentobarbital sodium-induced sleep time test and sodium barbital-induced sleep onset latency test demonstrated that gastrodin can prolong the sleeping time and shorten the sleep onset latency in mouse, suggesting that gastrodin has the sedative and hypnotic effects .Gastrodin also has antiepileptic effect. It suggested that gastrodin may inhibit the hippocampal excitatory neurotransmitter receptors of amino acid glutamate, activate hippocampal inhibitory neurotransmitter receptor of GABA, reduce the excitability of the cerebral cortex, and thus attenuate the development of epilepsy to play a role of antiepileptic effect .Additionally, research has shown that gastrodin has certain pharmacological effect on scavenging free radicals and inhibiting the central nerve cell apoptosis, etc., which may be related to antiaging and neural protection . According to the available references, the researches of pharmacology and clinical efficacy of gastrodin are very preliminary; more research evidences still need to confirm whether gastrodin is the active constituent of rhizoma gastrodiae.

Physical properties

Appearance: white prismatic crystal, odorless, and bitter; little hygroscopicity. Solubility: soluble in water, methanol, ethanol, acetone, and acetonyl acetate, insoluble in chloroform, and poorly soluble in ethyl ether. Melting point: ?153 to 156?°C. Specific optical rotation: ?68 to ?72° .