Kapikacchu: The Brain Medicine

Ancient civilizations throughout the world have survived for so many years, on the wisdom of nature in every field. Natural ways of living and managing disease have been the mainstay of all these cultures. In today’s era too almost 80% of the world population relies on herbal medicine to sustain their health care needs. Herbal medication in the form of folklore medicine or home remedies is the mainstay of disease cure in Asian, African continents as continues to be the first line of treatment in mild to moderately severe illnesses.^[1,2] Kapikacchu (Mucuna pruriens Linn.) is an important herb mentioned in the Ayurvedic medical literature.^[3] The plant is beneficial in parkinsonism, male infertility, neurological disorders etc. The negative effects are caused due to the exposure to the pod hair that’s known to cause skin allergy, basically irritation and itching. That explains the name Kapikacchu. M. pruriens is widely used to manage impotency. The aphrodisiac properties of this herb are known to improve the semen quality in terms count and quality, motility etc.,^[4] and is also useful in the management of diabetes mellitus and known to possess antitumour properties too. The seeds exhibit multi-systemic functions like inflammatory arthritis, diabetes mellitus, neurological disorders like parkinson’s disease, fever and inflammations.^[5,6] This review study is an attempted to provide detailed information about this herb collected from various Ayurvedic texts and its corelative studies through the lens of pharmacology in terms of its phytoconstituents and pharmacological actions.