Abstract
Treatment options for most cancers are still insufficient, despite developments and technology advancements. It has been postulated that the immune response to progressive tumors is insufficient due to a deficiency in afferent mechanisms responsible for the development of tumor-reactive T cells. Many patients treated for cancer will have their cancer recurrence, often after a long remission period. This suggests that there are a small number of tumor cells that remain alive after standard treatment(s) - alone or in combination and have been less effective in combating metastasis that represents the most elaborate hurdle to overcome in the cure of the disease. Therefore, any new effective and safe therapeutic agents will be highly demanded. To circumvent many plant extracts have attributed for their chemoprotective potentials and their influence on the human immune system. It is now well recognized that immunomodulation of immune response could provide an alternative or addition to conventional chemotherapy for a variety of disease conditions. However, many hurdles still exist. In recent years, there has been a tremendous interest either in harnessing the immune system or towards plant-derived immunomodulators as anticancer agents for their efficacy, safety and their targeted drug action and drug delivery mechanisms. This review discusses Phyllanthus Schum. & Thonn. their chemopreventive and immunomodulatory properties over the past few years. Although, as many as 500 important bioactive phytochemical compounds have been isolated from Phyllanthus their chemotherapeutic, immunomodulatory properties, molecular targets and modes of action are yet to be enlightened in detail. Hence, the theme of this review is very useful for further research on Phyllanthus species. because many phytochemicals from these plants have demonstrated preclinical therapeutic efficacy for a wide range of human diseases.