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Shankhapushpi (Convolvulus pluricaulis Choisy): Validation of the Ayurvedic therapeutic claims through contemporary studies

2014; Medknow; Volume: 8; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.22377/ijgp.v8i4.413

1998-4103

Hetal Amin, Rohit Sharma, Mahesh Vyas, PK Prajapati, Kartar Singh Dhiman,

Phytochemicals and Medicinal Plants

Shankhapushpi (Convolvulus pluricaulis Choisy, CP) is an extremely versatile plant, commonly prescribed as nootropic (medhya), rejuvenator, nervine tonic in epilepsy, insanity and possesses wide range of therapeutic attributes. Since it is an essential ingredient of myriad popular Ayurvedic monoherbal or polyherbal preparations, it is commercially quite exploitable. Although CP exhibits a wide range of therapeutic attributes, only scattered information exploring the curative potential of CP is available, and there is a need to assemble it. Therefore, to revalidate the Ayurvedic therapeutic claims of Shankhapushpi in light of contemporary experimental and clinical studies, this study was carried out. Information was extracted from various Ayurvedic literature viz. Brihattrayi (Charaka Samhita, Sushruta Samhita and Ashtanga Hridaya) and Nighantu (lexicon). Online studies available on Convolvulus pluricaulis Choisy published in Pubmed, Scopemed, Pubmed Central Databases, Dhara online database and other allied databases were also rationally reviewed and documented in the present review. The current work appears to be the first of its kind and can be considered a reference standard for future studies. Key words: Ayurveda, Convolvulus pluricaulis, shankhapushpi