Hepatoprotective effect of Rhodomyrtus tomentosa fruit juice in rats fed with high fat high cholesterol diet

Abstract

In this study we conducted experiments to prove the effectiveness of Rhodomyrtus tomentosa fruit juice as hepatoprotective agent in rats fed with high fat high cholesterol diet (HFHCD). The experiments were carried out using male albino rats which were fed with HFHCD for 15 days and at the same time orally supplemented with R. tomentosa fruit juice (RTFJ) in doses of 500, 1000 and 2000 mg/kg bw daily for 15 days. Simvastatin is used as a positive control. At the end of the experiment, the liver function markers in serum, AST (aspartate aminotransferase) and ALT (alanine aminotransferase) were determined as well as the histopathological image of the liver. Results of the experiments showed that HFHCD significantly induced hepatotoxicity showed by increase of sAST and sALT level. Supplementation of RTFJ significantly prevent the increase of sAST and sALT levels and maintained healthy histopathological image of liver tissue in rats fed with HFHCD, reduce fat accumulation and balloning hepatocytes as seen in untreated rats. From the results we concluded that R. tomentosa fruit juice possess significant hepatoprotective activity in rats fed with high fat high cholesterol diet, and therefore could be develop further as functional food to prevent hepatic diseases due to high fat high cholesterol diet.