Statins Accelerated Arthritic Incidence: Ex vivo Antioxidant and Histopathological Analysis

Abstract

Statins are conventionally used medicaments for the treatment of hyperlipidemia and hypertension. Apart from the aforementioned pharmacological action, statin use was associated with increased risk for developing rheumatoid arthritis due to its immunomodulatory property. The present study focused to demonstrate whether statin use accelerated arthritic incidence. The Ex vivo antioxidant study was performed using Lipid peroxidation (LPO) and Superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity assay. Both the Antioxidant study was evaluated from tissue homogenates. Each homogenate was centrifuged, and the resulting supernatant fraction was used to determine the enzyme activity. The histopathological analysis of ankle joints was conducted by hematoxylin eosin staining technique. The result obtained from Lipid peroxidation study showed that both Pitavastatin and Lovastatin treated tissues exhibited significant increase (p<0.001) in enzyme activity due to the elevated level of malonaldehyde formation. The Superoxide dismutase activity assay of both test drugs on tissue homogenate was found that significant decrease (p<0.001) in SOD level contributed cartilage degradation due to the generation of free radicals. The histopathological analysis also revealed that scattered inflammatory cells destructs the normal articular structure in rat joint tissues showed the evidence of arthritic induction. The study confirmed that statins had a strong influence on arthritic onset by oxidative stress in patients with hyperlipidemia and hypertension.