Figure 2.

Effects of administration of rikkunshito (N = 12/group) alone and in combination with a ghrelin receptor antagonist on delayed gastric emptying (A) and plasma acylated ghrelin levels (B) in ICV UCN1‐treated rats. Distilled water (DW) or rikkunshito was orally administered ICV 1 h before. In addition, saline or ghrelin receptor antagonist [D‐Lys³]‐GHRP‐6 (4 μmol/mL/kg) was intravenously administered into the tail vein 1 min after ICV administration of PBS or UCN1 (300 pmol/rat). One hour after ICV, all groups were gavaged with the test meal (1 mL/rat), and 2 h thereafter, animals were euthanized to determine the percentage of gastric emptying and plasma acylated ghrelin levels. Each bar represents the mean ± SEM (N = 12/group). Significance was identified using the Student's t‐test or Aspin–Welch t‐test. ⁺⁺ p < 0.01, ⁺⁺⁺ p < 0.001 compared with the PBS‐treated group. Significance of multiple groups were determined by one‐way anova, followed by Dunnett's post hoc test. *p < 0.05 compared with the UCN1‐treated group. RKT: rikkunshito.