Serenoa repens: A Phytochemical and Pharmacological Review

Background: The dried ripe fruit of Serenoa repens (W. Bartram) Small (Arecaceae) is traditionally used for urinary tract disorders, infertility, and prostate hyperplasia in men and for hormonal disturbances and infertility in women. Aim: This paper aims to introduce a collective overview of S. repens research regarding its ethnopharmacological uses, chemical constituents, pharmacological effects, and toxicity. This was performed to identify the research gaps in current studies on S. repens, and suggest potential avenues for further investigation.Method: A review of the literature on S. repens was conducted from inception to December 2023. The data was acquired through Egyptian Knowledge Bank (EKB), Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, PubMed, and Elsevier databases. Furthermore, a bibliometric analysis of research output on S. repens was conducted until December 2023 using the Scopus database. Data was analyzed, and VOSviewer software was used to visualize the relationships between authors, countries, and keywords in the retrieved documents. Results: S. repens is reported to exhibit anti-androgenic, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anti-proliferative, and apoptotic activities, thereby alleviating symptoms associated with benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH) and chronic prostatitis. Phytosterols (mainly β-sitosterol) and fatty acids (predominantly lauric and oleic acid) were regarded as the chief active constituents responsible for such activities.Conclusions: Based on this review, using S. repens extract in BPH management has been the focal point over the last few years. Recently, interest has been raised in other androgen-related conditions, such as androgenetic alopecia, yet these uses are still under investigation. To maximize the medicinal uses of S. repens, we suggest that more research to be performed to unveil new phytochemicals and their biological activities.