About this Research Topic

Background

The urinary system consisting of the kidneys, ureters, bladder and urethra, not only acts as the body's elimination system to remove waste from the body, but also regulates blood volume and pressure, blood pH levels, etc. Diseases of the urinary system can both arise from and affect other systems as a result of changes in the body. Urological disorders convey a huge economic and patient quality-of-life burden with over 26 million people suffering from urological disorders and an annual expenditure of over $11 billion. There are a wide variety of urological diseases or lesions, including lower urinary tract infections, lower urinary tract symptoms, and other urological dysfunctions caused by prostate disease, metabolic disorders, vascular diseases, etc. Currently, it is necessary to propose new targets, methods and drugs for the treatment of urological diseases due to the complex aetiology of these diseases, the difficulty of the existing drug delivery, side effects of current treatments and unsatisfied patient compliance.
Compared with current clinical treatment which has problems of drug tolerance, bothersome side effects and high cost, alternative treatment including herbs has the advantages of high efficiency, low toxicity and low cost, and is more easily accepted by patients. Clinical studies have confirmed the remarkable efficacy of alternative treatments for chronic urological diseases such as diabetic nephropathy, urological infections and overactive bladder. It has also been found that herbal medicines have a variety of activities such as anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant and anti-apoptotic, which have potential in the treatment of urological diseases and are worthy of further study. Therefore, we hope to prepare a collection of articles to facilitate the exchange of information among relevant researchers on the key roles and mechanisms played by alternative treatments, herbs and their active ingredients in the treatment of urological diseases, to provide a theoretical basis for clinical applications, and to stimulate the development of relevant therapeutic agents by exploiting their multi-target characteristics. We also encourage the use of high-throughput tools (e.g. transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics) to explore the targets and pathways between alternative medicines and urological diseases.

Areas of interest include clinical and experimental research, but are not limited to:
• Lower urinary tract infections
• Lower urinary tract symptoms such as bladder overactivity, bladder underactivity, etc.
• Prostate diseases including benign prostatic hyperplasia, prostatitis, and other prostatic diseases
• Diabetic nephropathy
• Other urological disorders associated with metabolic disorders and vascular diseases

Manuscripts that did not follow instructions (The four pillars) Will not be considered for publication. Specifically, please note:
- Research using a network analysis approach without in vitro or in vivo pharmacological experiments are not within the scope of the journal and Will be rejected without peer review
- Positive control must be included in the experiments.
- A batch number of commercial products should be included, and their chemical compositions must be disclosed.
- Extracts of herbs and herbal mixtures should be phytochemically characterized.
- In vivo tests must contain more than two doses at a pharmacologically relevant dose level
- The full botanical validation and a chemical profile of the material is essential (Also in case of polyherbal preparations)


All manuscripts must comply with our guidelines - the four pillars of best practice in ethnopharmacology (see www.frontiersin.org/files/pdf/4_pillars_FULL_TEXT.pdf) and the ConPhyMP statement: Front. Pharmacol. 13:953205. https://doi.org/10.3389/fphar.2022.953205).

Keywords: Urological diseases, Herbal medicine, Active compounds, Mechanism of action, Drug discovery, Molecular targets

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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