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World J Pharmacol. Jun 9, 2015; 4(2): 219-226
Published online Jun 9, 2015. doi: 10.5497/wjp.v4.i2.219
Challenges and opportunities in the treatment of ulcerative colitis
Sunil Ashokrao Nirmal, Sunil Shivaji Gangurde, Pratiksha Shankar Dumbre, Subodh Chandra Pal, Subhash Chandra Mandal
Sunil Ashokrao Nirmal, Department of Pharmacognosy, Pravara Rural College of Pharmacy, Loni, Maharashtra 413736, India
Sunil Shivaji Gangurde, Biotechnology Centre, Post Graduate Institute, Dr. PDKV, Maharashtra 413736, India
Pratiksha Shankar Dumbre, Sarswati Vidyabhavan College of Pharmacy, Mumbai, Maharashtra 413736, India
Subodh Chandra Pal, Department of Pharmacognosy, NDMVP’s College of Pharmacy, Nasik, Maharashtra 413736, India
Subhash Chandra Mandal, Pharmacognosy and Phytotherapy Research Laboratory, Division of Pharmacognosy, Department of Pharmaceutical Technology, Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700032, India
Author contributions: Nirmal SA collected data about ulcerative colitis; Gangurde SS contributed to manuscript preparation; Dumbre PS contributed to manuscript preparation and editing data; Pal SC collected data about various plants used for the treatment of ulcerative colitis; Mandal SC collected data about various plants used for the treatment of ulcerative colitis.
Conflict-of-interest: All the authors do not have any conflict of interest.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Dr. Sunil Ashokrao Nirmal, Associate Professor, Head, Department of Pharmacognosy, Pravara Rural College of Pharmacy, Loni, Tal- Rahata, Dist-Ahmednagar, Maharashtra 413736, India. nirmalsunil@rediffmail.com
Telephone: +91-97-66126772 Fax: +91-24-22273528
Received: November 28, 2014
Peer-review started: November 29, 2014
First decision: January 8, 2015
Revised: January 26, 2015
Accepted: April 8, 2015
Article in press: April 9, 2015
Published online: June 9, 2015
Core Tip

Core tip: Ulcerative colitis (UC) is one of the diseases of gastro intestinal tract having many serious complications. Many synthetic drugs are available for the treatment of UC but they have many serious side effects after long term use. This review presents potential of traditional/herbal drugs in the treatment of ulcerative colitis. Herbal drugs have great potential with safety which could be better alternative to synthetic drugs.