Research Article Herbal Substance, Acteoside, Alleviates Intestinal Mucositis in Mice Daniel Reinke, 1,2 Stamatiki Kritas, 1 Panagiotis Polychronopoulos, 3 Alexios L. Skaltsounis, 3 Nektarios Aligiannis, 3 and Cuong D. Tran 1,2 1 Gastroenterology Unit, Women’s & Children’s Health Network, 72 King William Road, North Adelaide, SA 5006, Australia 2 Discipline of Physiology, School of Medical Sciences, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia 3 Department of Pharmacognosy & Natural Products Chemistry, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, 15771 Ilisia, Greece Correspondence should be addressed to Cuong D. Tran; cuong.tran@adelaide.edu.au Received 21 October 2014; Revised 4 December 2014; Accepted 4 December 2014 Academic Editor: Gianfranco D. Alpini Copyright © 2015 Daniel Reinke et al. his is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. his study investigated the role of acteoside in the amelioration of mucositis. C57BL/6 mice were gavaged daily with acteoside 600 g for 5d prior to induction of mucositis and throughout the experimental period. Mucositis was induced by methotrexate (MTX; 12.5 mg/kg; s.c.). Mice were culled on d 5 and d 11 ater MTX. he duodenum, jejunum, and ileum were collected for myeloperoxidase (MPO) activity, metallothionein (MT) levels, and histology. Acteoside reduced histological severity scores by 75, 78, and 88% in the duodenum, jejunum, and ileum, respectively, compared to MTX-controls on d 5. Acteoside reduced crypt depth by 49, 51, and 33% and increased villus height by 19, 38, and 10% in the duodenum, jejunum, and ileum, respectively, compared to MTX-controls on d 5. Acteoside decreased MT by 50% compared to MTX-control mice on d 5. Acteoside decreased MPO by 60% and 30% in the duodenum and jejunum, respectively, compared to MTX-controls on d 5. Acteoside alleviated MTX-induced small intestinal mucositis possibly by preventing inlammation. 1. Introduction Mucositis is characterised by the degradation and increased ulceration of the protective mucosal layer within the gas- trointestinal tract (GIT) [1] and occurs in over 40% of all cancer patients that undergo chemotherapy or radiotherapy. Chemotherapeutic agents, such as methotrexate (MTX), attack rapidly dividing cancer cells by inhibiting folate pro- duction in RNA and DNA synthesis [1–3]. However, these agents are unable to diferentiate between all rapidly dividing cells resulting in destruction of the basal cells and damage to connective tissue in the GIT [3]. Damage to the intestinal lining causes debilitating symp- toms [4, 5]. hese symptoms are divided into two categories, pain and inlammation. Pain symptoms include loss of eating and eventual anorexia [6]. Inlammation symptoms include diarrhoea, vomiting, and reduced nutrient uptake [7]. he current treatments for mucositis are systemic antibi- otics [7–9], anti-inlammatories such as benzydamine and lurbiprofen [7], reducing the immune response and inlam- matory markers present in the small intestine [5, 10], and nonspeciic pain killers [8] which reduce the amount of damage signalling by nociceptors [11]. Antibiotics decrease levels of bacteria in the small intestine reducing immune mediated inlammation responses [7–9]. hese treatments only mask the symptoms but do not treat the condition. While there are currently no efective treatments for mucositis, many are in development. Numerous novel com- pounds which may provide preventative protection are being examined, for example, growth factors such as palifermin [7, 8], free radical scavengers such as amifostine [7, 8], or herbal substance such as iberogast [12] and Rhodiola algida [13]. he herbal substance, acteoside, is a phenylpropanoid gly- coside that is derived from plant species in the Scrophularia genus [14, 15]. Plants containing acteoside are oten used in traditional medicine to treat a variety of illnesses, such as tumours [16] and inlammation [17]. Hausmann et al. [18] Hindawi Publishing Corporation Gastroenterology Research and Practice Volume 2015, Article ID 327872, 9 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/327872