Advancements in Traditional Medicinal Plants Used in Epilepsy

From the times immemorial plants have been used by mankind for their relieving and therapeutic abilities and still we rely on their healing properties. Plants having active constituent have a direct pharmacological action on our body including various organs. One such major organ is brain, so complex that still only few drugs are approved by drug authorities for ailments like epilepsy. The Indian system of medicine “Ayurveda” classified the plants affecting our brain. Epilepsy is one such condition and may be defined as a neuropsychological disorder, which occurs due to over discharge of neurotransmitter substance. Epilepsy differs from seizure; a seizure is the paroxysmal events due to abnormal excessive hyper synchronous discharge from an aggregate of central nervous system (CNS) neurons. Epilepsy describes a condition in which a person has recurrent seizures, due to chronic underlying process. There are number of drugs available for treatment of epilepsy in modern therapy. But the major disadvantage being faced is their chronic side effects. Treatment of epilepsy with herbal drugs as adjuvant seems to be more beneficial and is gaining more popularity due to their fewer side effects. Herbal drugs are acting at target site having same mechanism of action as that of synthetic drugs. There are number of drugs being used in the traditional medicine for treatment of epilepsy and presently many of these drugs are being explored scientifically to ascertain their anticonvulsant activity. This review compiles the work done regarding the newly explored medicinal plants for anticonvulsant activity along with their mechanism of action.