Tropical Journal of Pharmaceutical Research

Original Research Article | OPEN ACCESS

Hypoglycaemic activity of Acalypha fruticosa Forssk extracts in normal rabbits

Amina El-Shaibany¹ , Molham AL-Habori², Shaza Al-Massarani¹, Adenan Al-Adhl², Andreas Michalsen³

¹Pharmacognosy Department, Pharmacy College, King Saud University, PO Box 22452, Riyadh 11495, Saudi Arabia; ²Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Sana'a, Yemen; ³Institute of Social Medicine, Epidemiology and Health Economics, Charite – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany.

For correspondence:- Amina El-Shaibany Email: aminashaibani@yahoo.com

Received: 22 April 2015 Accepted: 25 June 2015 Published: 30 August 2015

Citation: El-Shaibany A, AL-Habori M, Al-Massarani S, Al-Adhl A, Michalsen A. Hypoglycaemic activity of Acalypha fruticosa Forssk extracts in normal rabbits. Trop J Pharm Res 2015; 14(8):1445-1450 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v14i8.17

© 2015 The authors.
This is an Open Access article that uses a funding model which does not charge readers or their institutions for access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) and the Budapest Open Access Initiative (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read), which permit unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited..

Abstract

Purpose: To investigate the hypoglycaemic activity of various extracts of the aerial part of Acalypha fruticosa in normal rabbits.

Methods: The rabbits were randomly assigned to 8 groups (n = 3) and treated with a single oral dose. Group 1 served as normal control and received 2 % dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO, 3 ml/kg); group 2 served as standard treatment and received metformin (300 mg/kg); groups 3 - 8 received different extracts of Acalypha fruticosa at a dose of (600 mg/kg) as follows: group 3, total methanol extract; group 4, Petroleum ether (PET) extract; group 5, chloroform extract; group 6, ethyl acetate extract; group 7, n-butanol extract; and group 8, aqueous extract. Serum glucose (fasting blood glucose, FBG) was determined using a diagnostic kit on a glucose analyzer.

Results: A single dose of the aqueous extract of Acalypha fruticosa significantly lowered (p < 0.5) FBG at 1, 2, 4, and 6 h by 16, 29.5, 19.8, and 23.9 %, respectively, compared with normal control group, whereas standard treatment (metformin) did not affect FBG at all of these time-points measured. Furthermore, the aqueous extract (AEA) lowered FBG at 1, 2, 4, and 6 h by 24, 34.4, 25.9, and 17 %, respectively (p < 0.5), compared with metformin treatment. Chloroform extract also significantly lowered FBG at 1, 2, and 4 h by 17.3, 24.8, and 14.7 %, respectively, compared to metformin treatment (p < 0.5).

Conclusion: The results of this study show that the aqueous extract of the aerial parts of Acalypha fruticosa possess potential hypoglycaemic activity but further studies are required to elucidate the exact mechanisms of action.

Keywords: Acalypha fruticosa, Hypoglycaemic activity, Fasting blood glucose, Metformin, Acute toxicity