Effect of the Traditional Chinese Medicine Shuganjieyu Formula on Constipation Type Irritable Bowel Syndrome and Brain-gut Axis in Rats

ObjectiveTo observe the intervention effect of Shuganjieyu Formula on the rat model of constipation irritable bowel syndrome (IBS-C) and its effects on 5- hydroxytryptamine (5-HT), corticotropin releasing hormone (CRH) and adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), and to explore their mechanism of regulating brain-gut axis function.MethodsTotally fourty rats were randomly divided into four groups with 10 rats in each group, including normal control group, model group, low (5 mg/kg) and high (20 mg/kg) doses of Shuganjieyu Formula groups. Except for the normal control group, the other three groups of rats were gavaged with ice water for preparing the IBS-C model. Subsequently, the low and high doses groups of rats were treated with Shuganjieyu Formula for 2 weeks via oral gavage. The body weight of rats, total particle number and water content of fecal in the four groups were observed for 28 days. At last, serum of inferior vena cava and colon were collected from rats after anesthesia of 3% pentobarbital sodium. The morphological changes of colon tissue and the count of mast cells (MC) were observed with light microscope. Immunohistochemistry was used to detect the positive expression of 5-HT in the colon of rats in each group. The serum levels of 5-HT, CRH and ACTH were detected by ELISA.ResultsCompared with the normal control group, the body weight of rats in IBS-C model group increased slowly, the number of fecal grains and the fecal water content decreased (P