Journal of Advancement in Medical and Life Sciences

The use of plant extracts and especially essential oils is a traditional medicine method that is many centuries and even millenniums old. We summarized and analyzed the effects of some essential oils or their extracts on Candida fungal strains and the methods used in testing antifungal in laboratories. The use of such essential oils in laboratory experiments showed considerable therapeutic results and antifungal effects on different Candida strains. The modern medicine, reconsider it in order to use it as an alternative to the antimycotic medication in fungal infections. The newest research demonstrated that these natural origin substances can be used with success in many cases of fungal infections. Keyword: essential oils, fungal infections, Candida species, natural origin antifungal. INTRODUCTION Candida infections are the most frequent fungal infections in human pathology. Most of them occur in immunocompromised and immunouppressed patients, or in persons with different risk factors, like HIV infection, cancer, transplant of marrow or other transplanted patients, and so on. The fungal superficial infections can cause discomfort and in some conditions can produce disseminated systemic infections. In the conditions of third world developing countries, the lack of industrial medication, and poor sanitation and lack of enough funds for buying modern medicines, the plants can be used as a source of antimicrobial and antifungal medicines. WHO recommends using this important source of medicines and established some guides for this activity. DISCUSSION The essential volatile oils The essential oils are secondary metabolites present in many plants, of course the content of them is tit very variable from species to species, and is influenced by different aspects, like plant parts that are used, vegetation phases or time of the year and of the day, extraction methods and others. Generally, the essential oils contain a mixture of substances and compounds, in very variable amounts, this aspect reduced the possibility to standardize the vegetal origin oils in order to have a scientific control over the therapy. The essential oils are used on a large scale against different bacteria and pathogenic fungi. An example is the plants Cinnamomum verum, Cymbopogon citratus, C. martini, Syzygium aromaticum used in traditional medicine in India [12]. They contain citral with geraniol and eugenol having inhibitory effects against C. albicans, inhibiting the germ’s tube formation and change the hydrophobicity of cell surface (the antifungal effect was established by macro dilution method). Following analysis, their Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC) was established. For example the citral and cinnamaldehide obtained from C. martini produced inhibition at a MIC of 45-200ug/ml and evident reduction of the infection. The oils with citrate and geraniol reduced the production of proteinase with about 80%. Essential oils from basil (Ocinum sanctum), chamomile (Matricaria camomilla), Oregano (Vaccinium sp.) and thyme (Thymus vulgaris) were also tested on isolates of Candida from clinical samples (C. albicans, C. parapsilopsis, C. tropicalis C. glabrata) [19]. The tests were performed according to Kirby Bauer and Vitek methods. ). Oils of Foeniculum vulgare, Carum carvi and Eucalyptus are well known essential oils with medicinal properties. In a recent study they were tested in vitro on Candida strains, using disk method [21]. As a result of this research, the lowest MIC values at which all the strains were sensible to Carum carvi oils was 0,03mg/ml MIC (C. albicans from laboratory, for example). The tests proved that the essential oils of different medicinal plants can be a serious alternative to chemical antifungals in certain conditions and the concentrations of essential oils play an important role in the treatment. The authors showed that the essential oils extracted from three aromatic plants have a certified antimicrobial effect and at the same time an antifungal potential. They tested extracts (oils) from Foeniculum vulgare (Apiaceae), Carum carvi (Apiaceae) and Eucalyptus sp. (Myrtaceae) in vitro, on C. albicans strains isolated from lung, a laboratory strain and the standard strain ATCC10231, by using disc diffusion and microdilution methods, demonstrating that C. carvi oil has the strongest antifungal activity. Essential oil extracted from Mentha piperita has a good antifungal activity against Candida yeasts. This is based on the high content of menthol (30 50%), carvone and menthone (1432%), as shown by the gas chromatograph analysis. The average MIC against 3 species of Candida (C albicans, C. tropicalis and C. glabrata) was 225 μg/ml, 248 μg/ml and 500μg/ml, respectively [20], results obtained by observing the inhibition areas on agar plates and inhibition of virulence. The toxicity of these compounds is very low. They play a role in inhibition of the transition phase from yeast to hyphal form and release of hydrolytic enzymes. Other species from the Mentha genus (M. longifolia, M. piperita. M. aquatica) contain volatile oils with