The beneficial effects of Ferula asafoetida oleo-gum resin in gastrointestinal disorders

Ferula asafoetida is a plant from Umbelliferae Family, which its gum is traditionally used to treat the gastrointestinal disorders (parasite, bloating, digestion, cancer). According to its traditional applications, the subject of this review was to evaluate the efficacy of F. asafoetida in management of different gastrointestinal disorders in modern medicine. For this purpose, the scientific resources (PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, Google Scholar, SpringerLink, SciFinder, ACS Publications, and Wiley), traditional books, and thesis were investigated by the word of F. asafoetida, Hing, and gastrointestinal tract and the results were evaluated. There was one clinical trial on the efficacy of F. asafoetida in treatment of functional dyspepsia, and the other pharmacological activities such as anti-parasite, anti-cancer, antidiarrhea and liver protective effects were evaluated in preclinical studies. Although, F. asafoetida can be proposed as a good candidate for treatment of gastrointestinal disorders, but the majority of studies have been limited to the experimental investigations. Therefore, evaluation of its efficacy and safety in well-designed human clinical studies is required to use of this valuable oleo-gum resin.