Hair restorer containing vetiver grass extract

Details Hair restorer containing vetiver grass extract Hair restorer containing vetiver grass extract

1999-05-25

2001-02-27

Tate, Christopher (Department: 1651)

Drug, bio-affecting and body treating compositions

Antigen, epitope, or other immunospecific immunoeffector

Conjugate or complex

C424S070100, C424S074000, C514S880000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06193976

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a composition containing an extract of Vetiver grass, having the effect of increasing or restoring hair growth, and/or preventing hair loss. More specifically, the present invention relates to a hair growth restoring and/or hair loss preventing composition containing an extract of the root of the plant
Vetiveria zizanioides.
2. Description of the Related Art
Efforts to Restore Hair Growth and/or Prevent Hair Loss
The recorded literature, including the medical, scientific and patent literature, relates various efforts to treat and/or prevent hair loss and to restore and/or encourage hair growth, particularly regarding hair on the human scalp. Some of these efforts have met with varying degrees of success, ranging from complete failure to more-recently available topically administered drugs such as Rogaine® (active ingredient, minoxidil) and orally administered drugs such as Propecia® (active ingredient, finasteride). The active ingredients in these two drugs have been approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration for promoting hair growth. Rogaine® and Propecia® exhibit some degree of success in promoting and/or restoring hair growth, particularly hair loss at the vertex or crown of the head, but administration of these drugs may lead to certain adverse side effects, including for example sexual dysfunction. Moreover, Rogaine® and Propecia® are to be used on a continual basis and are relatively expensive. Accordingly, individuals with thinning hair or hair loss, or individuals likely to experience thinning hair or hair loss, especially men with thinning hair or hair loss on the scalp or, more particularly, on the vertex of the head, are in need of alternative treatments to encourage and/or restore hair growth.
Accordingly, there have been a variety of efforts to fulfill this need. As evidence of these efforts, the PTO has granted approximately 100 patents on methods and or compositions for treating hair loss and/or thinning hair. Among these patent are patents that disclose baldness remedies made from botanical, vegetative, or other found materials. For example, these patents include U.S. Pat. No. 5,679,378 (for the topical use of dead sea mud); U.S. Pat. No. 5,744,128 (for the topical use of emu oil); U.S. Pat. No. 5,665,342 (for the topical use of potato peelings and lantana leaves); U.S. Pat. No. 5,597,575 (for the topical use of vitamin D3 and aloe); U.S. Pat. No. 5,674,510 (for the topical use of garlic powder, brewers yeast, grapefruit, acidic acid and kelp); U.S. Pat. No. 5,750,108 (for the topical use of tea tree oil, chlorine dioxide and acidic solution and saw palmetto berry extract); U.S. Pat. No. 5,695,748 (for the topical use of sage, aloe and nettles, castor oil, shea butter, wheat germ oil and white iodine) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,494,667 (for the topical use of pine extract and bamboo extract or Japanese apricot). The United States Food and Drug Administration had not determined whether these methods and/or compositions of treating hair loss and restoring hair growth are uniformly safe and effective.
Vetiver Grass
There are at least seventeen known varieties of Vetiver grass, the most common of which is
Vetiveria zizanioides
. The taxonomic information of the Vetiver grasses, which are often also generically referred to as Vetiveria Bory, is as follows: Family-Graminae (Poaceae); Subfamily-Panicoideae; Tribe-Andropogoneae; subtribe-Sorghinae. Vetiver grasses are common to flood plains and stream banks and are generically described as follows: They are tufted perennials, having a line of hairs at the ligule; the inflorescence is a panicle. The primary branches of the panicle are whorled, simple, and each bears a raceme. The raceme is typically long and slender, comprising (20)3-10 spikelet pairs. The spikelet are sessile and laterally compressed, and the plant's callus is obtuse to pungent, and is often large and concical. The lower glume is chartaceous to coriaceous, spinulose, and the upper glume is shortly awned. See, e.g., Watson, L. and M. J. Dallwitz (1989)
Grass Genera of the World
, Australian National University Printing Service, Canberra. Further information regarding the Vetiver grasses may be obtained from The Vetiver Network at 15 Wirt Street NW, Leesburg Va. 20176 USA, phone: (703) 771-1942, facsimile: (703) 771-8260 (Email: vetiver@vetiver.org; Home page: http://www.vetiver.org/).
Specimens of the
Vetiveria zizanioides
(L.) Nash subspecies of Vetriver grass have been identified in Paraguay (in the State of Paraguari) by David R. Brenner at 250 m, 25.54 S 54.09 W and by Elissa Zardini and C. Cuevas at 500 m, 25.54 S 54.09 W, and in Peru (in the State of Loreto) by W. H. Lewis, M. Elvin-Lewis, M. C. Gnerre, and C. Diaz at 160 m, 3.15 S 25.50 W. According to the reports of W. H. Lewis et al., the native people in the State of Loreto in Peru, who identify the
Vetiveria zizanioides
(L.) Nash subspecies by the name “pachuli,” crush the root and rhizome, and use the obtained juice to wash their hair. These native people are also reported to have boiled the root, and used the decoction to wash their hair. In other acounts, the roots of this plant have also been reported to have been used by the native people of Loreto as a medicine to treat, among other conditions, dermatitis, hemorrhoids, fever, rheumatism, and neuralgia, and have been used for the control of fungal growth. However, use to prevent hair loss or to facilitate hair growth is not known.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention includes methods for the treatment and/or prevention of hair loss and methods for the regeneration or restoration of hair growth comprising a step of identifying an individual suffering from or susceptible to hair loss or hair thinning or in need of hair regeneration, and a step of administering an extract of the root of a Vetiver grass. Preferably, the extract is an aqueous extract and is administered topically. Also preferably, the Vetiver grass is a subspecies of
Vetiveria zizanioides
, and is most preferably
Vetiveria zizanioides
(L.) Nash. The present invention also provides a composition, preferably in the from of a lotion, gel, cream, or other suspension, and a distinct chemical compound or class of chemical compounds therein, effective in restoring hair growth, preventing hair loss, and/or reversing the effects of hair thinning. The composition may include an effective amount of a hair loss preventative or hair growth promoting composition isolatable as an extract of the roots of a Vetiver grass, together with a pharmaceutically-acceptable topical carrier other than water.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
One object of the present invention is to provide a non-toxic hair growth restorer and/or hair loss preventer. Another object of the present invention is to provide a relatively inexpensive hair growth restoring composition or hair loss preventing composition, including a compound or class of compounds having the effect of restoring hair growth and/or preventing hair loss. Another objective of the present invention is to provide an ingestable, injectable, or topically-applicable composition for restoring hair growth and/or preventing hair loss. Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a renewable resource for a hair growth restorer or hair loss preventing compound or class of compounds. It shall be understood that the invention as described and claimed herein should optimally satisfy more than one of the objects of the present invention, but need not simultaneously satisfy all, or even one, of the objects of the present invention, nor need it satisfy any particular object of the invention.
As used herein, the terms “restore hair growth,” “hair restorer,” and “to restore hair growth” are essentially interchangeable. Each refers to methods or compositions for increasing the amount of hair growth. These phrases do not necessarily refer to the production of a full head of hair, nor do they refer to the restor

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