Research Projects
Field of Co-creation
Prevention of diabetes mellitus by traditional Asian drugs and foods
Project Leader
College of Life Sciences
Professor Mikio Nishizawa
Summary and Aims of the Project
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the number of adults with diabetes reached 422 million in 2014, a nearly fourfold increase over 30 years. While half of the patients are from China, India, the U.S., Brazil and Indonesia, there are a lot of cases in Japan as well. Also, nearly half the patients die by the age of 70 from a combination of cardiovascular and kidney abnormalities. Because it may be accompanied by serious symptoms such as blindness due to neuropathy and retinopathy, there is an urgent need to reduce diabetes and extend healthy life expectancy in order to avoid economic losses and increasing medical costs. On this point, general vascular inflammation is related with diabetes, and if relatively inexpensive traditional medicines can prevent inflammation and diabetes, we can solve a critical health issue for Asia.
In our previous project, we picked up some herbal medicines with anti-inflammatory effects from the Kampo medicines in Japanese traditional medication and Jamu, herbal medicines in traditional Indonesian medication, and clarified that their anti-inflammatory effect is also effective for diabetes. In this project, we separate the components from these herbal medicines and identify the specific effects of each component against diabetes. In examining the effectiveness of traditional medicines, this project explores the possibility of preventing diabetes by functional foods. Furthermore, this project aims to establish a foundation to develop alternative treatments for diabetes, so that we can contribute to extending healthy life expectancy throughout Asia and yield the "co-creation of health".
In addition, this project also strives to achieve the third goal of the SDGs, "Health and Welfare for All People" from the above research scheme. We can expect from this project that traditional herbal medicines will enhance the human immune system and be effective in preventing diabetes that causes immunity to deteriorate.
Jamu markets in Indonesia