A review on medicinal plants for the management of diabetes mellitus

Diabetes is a metabolic disorder in which there are high levels of sugar in the blood, a condition called hyperglycemia. Under normal conditions, food is broken down to glucose which then enters the bloodstream and acts as fuel for the body. The pancreas produces a hormone called insulin which helps to carry glucose from the bloodstream into muscle, fat and liver where it can be used as fuel. Diabetics are not able to move this sugar out of the bloodstream because of two primary reasons as their pancreas does not produce enough insulin and/or their cells do not respond normally to insulin, a condition called insulin resistance. This is why people with diabetes have high blood sugar levels. Diabetes mellitus can induce life-threatening health problems such as blindness, heart disease, kidney damage, and stroke. Although the cure of DM has improved over the past decades, its morbidity and mortality rates remain high. Hence, new therapeutic strategies are needed to overcome the burden of this disease. One such prevention and treatment strategy that is easily accessible to diabetic patients at low cost is the use of medicinal plants The research objective of this review article is to study DM and explore its treatment modalities based on medicinal plants. Results of numerous scientific investigations revealed that chemical constituents present in some medicinal plants possess anti-hypoglycemic activities and show promise for the prevention and/or control of DM.