Hawthorn

Crataegus monogyna Fruit Ext.Dry Conc Hawthorn refers to several species within the genus Crataegus, a member of the Rosaceae family, widely distributed across the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, including Europe, Asia, and North America. The medicinal use of hawthorn has an extensive history spanning multiple cultures and millennia. In Europe, hawthorn's cardiovascular benefits were first documented by the Greek physician Dioscorides in the first century A.D., making it the oldest known medicinal plant in European herbal medicine. In China, hawthorn was first recorded in the Tang Materia Medica (Tang Ben Cao) dating back to 659 A.D., the first known official pharmacopeia in the world. Traditionally, hawthorn has been used as an edible medicinal plant for cardiovascular conditions such as mild heart failure (New York Heart Association class II), angina, hypertension, and arrhythmias, as well as for digestive ailments and as a food source [1,2]. The pharmacologically active components include flavonoids such as hyperoside, vitexin, vitexin-2"-O-rhamnoside, rutin, and quercetin, oligomeric procyanidins (including epicatechin, procyanidin B2, B5, and C1), phenolic acids (particularly chlorogenic acid), triterpenes, and anthocyanins. These phytochemicals contribute to hawthorn's antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, vasodilatory, and positive inotropic effects [2,3,4].