Opioid analgesics are commonly used in chronic pain management despite a potential risk of rewarding. However, it remains unclear whether opioid analgesia would enhance the opioid rewarding effect thereby contributing to opioid rewarding. Utilizing a rat paradigm of conditioned place preference (CPP) combined with ankle monoarthritis as a condition of persistent nociception, we showed that anal...

Lewis rats injected in the hind paw with Mycobacterium butyricum develop a severe polyarthritis which shares certain features in common with rheumatoid arthritis in man. Spleen and peripheral blood mononuclear cells from rats with this form of arthritic disease proliferate poorly in vitro in response to concanavalin A (con A), phytohaemagglutinin (PHA), and pokeweed mitogen (PWM). The splenic h...

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a polyarticular inflammatory, angiogenic disease. Synovial angiogenesis contributes to inflammation in RA. In this study we have developed an arthritic model in rats using a novel angiogenic protein (NAP), isolated from human synovial fluid of RA patients. We produced anti-NAP monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and investigated the therapeutic efficacy of the same in adju...

Adjuvant arthritis is an animal model of rheumatoid arthritis that decreases liver and circulating IGF-I as well as skeletal muscle mass. The aim of this work was to elucidate whether IGF-I administration was able to prevent the effect of arthritis on body weight and on two skeletal muscles, gastrocnemius and soleus. On day 4 after adjuvant injection, control and arthritic rats were treated wit...

Objective: The objective of the present study was to isolate galangin from methanolic extract of Alpinia officinarum (MEAO) by bioassay guided fractionation using hexane–ethyl acetate as a solvent and evaluated the anti-arthritic effect of galangin and MEAO in complete Freund’s adjuvant (CFA) induced arthritis in wistar rats. Methods: Arthritis was induced by intradermal injection of CFA into t...

Pain has a strong emotional component. A key player in emotionality, the amygdala is also involved in pain processing. Our previous studies showed synaptic plasticity in the central nucleus of the amygdala (CeA) in a model of arthritic pain. Here, we address the role of group III metabotropic glutamate receptors (mGluRs) in the regulation of synaptic transmission in CeA neurons. Whole-cell curr...

The use of intra-articular steroids in the treatment of osteo-arthritis of the knee joints has not been much discussed in the literature. Burgess (1957) states that intra-articular hydrocortone is of most value in joints distended by synovial fluid. Williams (1958) found that hydrocortisone tertiarybutylacetate was effective over a longer period than hydrocortisone, but that both might dramatic...

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic inflammatory disease, leading to progressive destruction of joints and extra-articular tissues, including organs such as liver and spleen. The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of a potential immunomodulator, natural polyphenol N-feruloylserotonin (N-f-5HT), with methotrexate (MTX), the standard in RA therapy, in the chronic phase of adjuvan...

Plectranthus amboinicus (P. amboinicus) is a folk herb that is used to treat inflammatory diseases or swelling symptoms in Taiwan. We investigated therapeutic efficacy of P. amboinicus in treating Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) using collagen-induced arthritis animal model. Arthritis was induced in Lewis rats by immunization with bovine type II collagen. Serum anti-collagen IgG, IgM and C-reactive p...

Background: Ventoluft Polyherbal formulation composes multiple traditional medicinal plants composed of various anti-inflammatory agents. Hence, the present study aimed to investigate effect on Freund’s complete adjuvant-induced arthritic male Wistar rats. Materials and methods: The included thirty-six rats, containing six in each. Arthritis was induced by injecting FCA (0.1ml) joints right sub...