An alcohol (ethanol) extract of turmeric was studied in rats as a treatment for peptic ulcers. An extract is a way of concentrating and purifying the active part of the drug. Peptic ulcers in humans occur in the stomach and the duodenum (upper intestine that attaches to the outlet of the stomach). They used standard animal models for peptic ulcers. In these models animals were caused to have ulcers by various stresses, drugs or cell destroying chemicals. Then they tested whether the extract could protect the lining of the stomach and duodenum from these injuries. The stresses were pyloric ligation (tying of the outlet of the stomach) and hypothermic-restraint stress (placing the rats in a cage in a cold room). The drugs were indomethacin, reserpine and cysteamine. The chemicals were 80% ethanol (alcohol), 0.6 M HCl (hydrochloric acid), 0.2 M NaOH (soda lye) and 25% NaCl (salt). When the rats were given the extract (500 milligram per each kg of rat weight) by mouth they were significantly protected against the ulcers caused by stress, the chemicals and the drugs indomethacin and reserpine. However this dose did not reduce the amount of ulcer injury in the duodenum caused by cysteamine enough to conclude that it was different than no treatment. They found that the tumeric extract increased the mucous in the wall of the stomach. It also restores ulcer protective substances, the non-protein sulfhydryl (NP-SH) content in the glandular stomachs of the rats.
Evaluation of turmeric (Curcuma longa) for gastric…[J Ethnopharmacol. 1990]