Human infectious diseases have significantly increasing during the past decade, especially in immunocompromised patients; as high as 10% percent of hospital acquired systemic infections are caused by fungi. Among animal and human pathogens, dermatomycetes are the main cause of dermatomycoses. The superficial infectionsthey cause are not life threatening but chronic and carrying a considerable morbidity. Under certain circumstances Candida spp. commensals (C. albicans and some non-albicans species commonly isolated from human oral cavity) become pathogenic, causing from mucous membrane infection (pseudomembranous candidiasis and denture-induced stomatitis) to a life-threatening systemic diseases, particularly in patients with a weak immune system. In addition to the increasing resistance of human pathogens to current commercial drugs, conventional treatments with many adverse effects become unsatisfactory, presenting aserious medical problem. Hence, the development of more effective and less toxic antifungal agents, including natural products, seems to be vitally important. Due to their biologically active secondary metabolites, many plants have been traditionally used in ethno medicine for their therapeutic antifungal potential, while some others, recently explored,prove to be very promising ones. Some essential oils (M. suaveolens, R. officinalis, S.officinalis, C. citrates, etc) and their main constituents, prove to play an important role as potential therapeutic agents. The main advantage of these natural products, particularly essential oils (which are lipophilic in nature and can easily penetrate the plasma membrane) is their ability to efficiently cure the most opportunistic fungal disease with no harmful effects on human and animal tissues.With growing interest in use of essential oils in the pharmaceutical industry, systematic examination of their preventive and therapeutic properties has become increasinglyimportant. This paper represents a review on antifungal efficacy of essential oils and their constituents in prevention and treatmentof some common opportunistic fungal diseases in humans

Essential oils in prevention and treatment of human opportunistic fungal diseases

249th National Meeting (2015)

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