Dieudonne Njamen1,
Benedicta N Nkeh-Chungag2 
,
Emmanuel Tsala3,
Zacharias T Fomum3,
Jean Claude Mbanya4,
George F Ngufor5
For correspondence:- Benedicta Nkeh-Chungag Email: bnkehchungag@wsu.ac.za Tel:+27475021989
Received: 10 March 2012 Accepted: 12 September 2012 Published: 18 October 2012
Citation: Njamen D, Nkeh-Chungag BN, Tsala E, Fomum ZT, Mbanya JC, Ngufor GF. Effect of Bridelia ferruginea (Euphorbiaceae) Leaf Extract on Sucrose-induced Glucose Intolerance in Rats. Trop J Pharm Res 2012; 11(5):759-765 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v11i5.9
© 2012 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..
Purpose: To evaluate the hypoglycaemic effect of the methanol extract of Bridelia ferruginea leaves (MEBF) on sucrose-induced glucose intolerance in rats.
Methods: Male Wistar rats, aged 6 - 7 weeks and weighing 140 - 160 g, were used. The animals were fed standard rat chow supplemented with 35%, 50% or 65% sucrose for 8 weeks while control animals were fed standard rat chow. The hypoglycaemic effect of MEBF and the reference drugs (tolbutamide, and metformin) in the animals were evaluated following a single dose of these drugs and 6-day treatment. Plasma lipid profiles were also determined.
Results: Fasting glucose concentrations ranged from 45 to 70 mg/dl, and the increase was significant in the sucrose diet groups from week 1. After 2 weeks on these diets, oral glucose tolerance test showed that sucrose feeding significantly impaired glucose homeostasis 1 and 2 hours after a glucose challenge (76.7 ± 2.0 versus 86.4 ± 8.5 and 66.7 ± 1.4 versus 75.5 ± 3.0, respectively). Fasting blood sugar levels were significantly (p < 0.05) reduced in sucrose-induced, glucose-intolerant rats after a single dose of MEBF. The extract also significantly reduced blood glucose (from 167 ± 23 mg/dL to 126 ± 5 mg/dL), serum total cholesterol (from 161 ± 20 mg/dL to 93 ± 10 mg/dL) and triglyceride levels (281 ± 25 mg/dL to 228 ± 5 mg/dL) in glucose intolerant rats after 6 days of treatment.
Conclusion: The methanol leaf extract of Bridelia ferruginea exhibited hypoglycaemic effect in glucose-intolerant rats.
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