Hamidu Usman1*, Aliyu Daja2, Saidu Ibrahim Ngulde3, Yaqub Ahmed Geidam4 and Abubakar Gidado2
1Department of Pure and Applied Chemistry, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria
2Department of Biochemistry, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria
3Department of Veterinary Pharmacology and Toxicology, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria
4Department of Veterinary Medicine, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria
*Corresponding author: usmanhamidu@unimaid.edu.ng, doi.org/10.55639/607.767574
ABSTRACT
Plants continue to play an important role in the treatment and management of many diseases, including diabetes mellitus, in many developing economies. Most often, a cocktail of plant mixtures is normally used in traditional practice rather than single plant, which are believed to offer more benefits. Adansonia digitata, Hyphaene thebaica, Ziziphus spina-christi, and Ziziphus mauritiana are some of those plants that are reported to have medicinal benefits and, most importantly, anti-diabetic activity. This study evaluated the hypoglyceamic and antidiabetic activity of the aqueous extracts of the fruit pulps and a recipe combining all the fruits in experimental rats. Aqueous extracts of the different fruits and the recipe were orally administered to normoglyceamic and Streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic rats, and their blood glucose was monitored over a period of 3 hours in the screening study. Two different doses of the recipe were also administered daily for four (4) weeks to STZ-diabetic rats to study the antidiabetic potential of the recipe. All the extracts did not significantly reduce the fasting blood glucose (FBG) of the normoglyceamic rats in the hypoglyceamic screening study. In the antidiabetic screening study, all the extracts lowered the FBG of their respective groups with percent reductions of 32%, 21%, 17%, and 46%, respectively, for Z. spina-christi, Z. mauritiana, A. digitata and H. thebaica extractives. The maximum percent reduction observed for the recipe was 25.5%. The daily administration of the recipe for four weeks also produced significant reductions that were not dose dependent. The 200 mg/kg bd. wt. dose showed a maximum reduction of 59.9%. The percentage reductions observed in the recipe-treated group were, however, lower than the percentage reductions seen in the insulin and glibenclamide-treated groups. The study confirms the antidiabetic properties of the individual fruits and the recipe, and thus confirms the traditional use of the fruits in the management of diabetes mellitus.
Keywords:
Diabetes,
Glyceamic,
Rats,
Recipe,
Streptozotocin