Anti-Breast Cancer Activity of Essential Oil: A Systematic Review

Breast cancer is the second highest cancer-related death worldwide. The treatment for breast cancer is via chemotherapy; however, occurrences of multidrug resistance, unselective targets, and physicochemical problems suggest that chemotherapy treatment is ineffective. Therefore, there is a need to find better alternatives. Essential oil is a plant secondary metabolite having promising bioactivities and pharmacological effects, including anti-breast cancer capabilities. This review intends to discuss and summarize the effect of essential oils on anti-breast cancer from published journals using keywords in PubMed, Scopus, and Google Scholar databases. Our findings reveal that the compositions of essential oils, mainly terpenoids, have excellent anti-breast cancer pharmacological effects with an IC50 value of 0.195 μg/mL. Hence, essential oils have potential as anti-breast cancer drugs candidates with the highest efficacy and the fewest side effects.