Histopathology of Trypanosoma brucei brucei infected red Sokoto goats experimentally infected and treated with crude ethanolic extract of Terminalia catappa

Abstract

The trypanocidal activity of crude ethanolic extract of Terminalia catappa stem bark was investigated on red sokoto goats experimentally infected with Trypanosoma brucei brucei. 15 male goats weighing between 8kg to 10kg were used in this experiment, randomly grouped into 5 groups with three goats per group. Goats in all the 5 groups were infected intravenously with T.b. brucei and after demonstration of parasitaemia Groups 1 to 4 were administered crude ethanolic extract of T. catappa as follows: 50mg/kg orally to group 1, 100mg/kg orally to group 2, 50mg/kg intraperitoneally to group 3 and 100mg/kg intraperitoneally to group 4 while group 5 served as untreated control. All treatments lasted for 7 days. Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of alkaloids, saponins, terpenoids and steroid. The histopathological findings did not reveal any effect of the extracts on the hearts of all T. catappa treated groups, although, lesions were observed on the spleen, liver, kidney and lung of both treated and untreated (control) group which could be as a result of the infection.