Kidney Disease is an increasingly common condition with limited treatment options placing a major financial and emotional burden on the community. There is emerging evidence in the literature about renoprotective complementary and alternative medicines. A primary goal of this article is to present the scientific evidence for the use of herbs like Andrographis paniculata (AP) as a complementary treatment for acute renal failure (ARF). Wistar rats were divided as follows: Normal, Gentamicin (GM) and Root extracts (Pt. ether, CHCl3 and MeOH) of AP (200 mg/kg; p.o.) treated groups. The nephrotoxic model was prepared by GM (80 mg/kg; i.p. × 8 days). The degree of nephroprotection was measured by using renal parameters like serum creatinine (SCr), serum urea (SU) and urinary proteins (UP) after 3, 7 and 10 days of ingestion of various extracts. Oral administration of Pt. ether (p<0.05), CHCl3 (p<0.01) and MeOH (p<0.001) extracts of AP patently prevented gentamicin induced elevated levels of SCr, SU and UP. The results were also supported by measuring the urine volume voided by each rat separately, of all the groups with time. The extent of protection offered by various extracts under study increased with the increasing time of treatment and polarity of the solvents. The signs of GM nephrotoxicity in rats are significantly mitigated by Pt. ether and CHCl3 extracts whereas the maximal alleviation of ARF was caused by MeOH root extract; hence, the methanolic root extract of AP can be advocated as a nephroprotective agent.
