Hepatoprotective potential of chestnut bee pollen on carbon
tetrachloride-induced hepatic damages in rats
Evid Based Complement Alternat Med, 2013;2013:461478
Bee pollen has been used as an apitherapy agent for several
centuries to treat burns, wounds, gastrointestinal disorders, and various other
diseases.
The aim of our study was to investigate the hepatoprotective
effects of chestnut bee pollen against carbon tetrachloride (CCI4)-induced
liver damage.
Total phenolic content, flavonoid, ferric
reducing/antioxidant power, and DPPH radical activity measurements were used as
antioxidant capacity determinants of the pollen. The study was conducted in
rats as seven groups. Two different concentrations of chestnut bee pollens (200
and 400 mg/kg/day) were given orally and one group was administered with
silibinin (50 mg/kg/day, i.p.) for seven days to the rats following the CCI4
treatment. The protective effect of the bee pollen was monitored by aspartate
transaminase (AST) and alanine transaminase (AST) activities, histopathological
imaging, and antioxidant parameters from the blood and liver samples of the
rats. The results were compared with the silibinin-treated and untreated
groups.
We detected that CCI4 treatment induced liver damage and
both the bee pollen and silibinin-treated groups reversed the damage; however,
silibinin caused significant weight loss and mortality due, severe diarrhea in
the rats. The chestnut pollen had showed 28.87 mg GAE/g DW of total phenolic
substance, 8.07 mg QUE/g DW of total flavonoid, 92.71 mg Cyn-3-glu/kg DW of
total anthocyanins, and 9 mg β -carotene/100 g DW of total carotenoid and
substantial amount of antioxidant power according to FRAP and DPPH activity.
The results demonstrated that the chestnut bee pollen
protects the hepatocytes from the oxidative stress and promotes the healing of
the liver damage induced by CCI4 toxicity. Our findings suggest that chestnut
bee pollen can be used as a safe alternative to the silibinin in the treatment
of liver injuries.
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