Assessment of intestinal permeability in preruminant calves by lactulose/mannitol test

P Klein,Z Volek,V Skřivanová,T Kleinová,J Moravcová

doi:10.22358/jafs/66725/2007

Abstract

Department of Chemistry of Natural Compounds, Institute of Chemical TechnologyPraha, CZ-166 28, Czech Republic(Received 24 April 2006; revised version 10 July 2006; accepted 2 February 2007)ABSTRACTThe aim of this study was to utilize the lactulose/mannitol test for assessment of intestinal permeability (IP) in preruminant calves. IP was increased experimentally by administration of Indomethacin. Both sugar markers were determined simultaneously as silyl-derivates in 5 h urinary production using the gas liquid chromatography technique. The index of IP was determined as the ratio between urinary recovery (%) of 10 g lactulose to 5 g D-mannitol. The IP index in control calves was 0.242±0.048. Doses of 20 and 60 mg Indomethacin did not signiﬁcantlyaffectIP,buttheIPindexwassigniﬁcantlyenhancedincalves receiving 120 mg of drug (0.541±0.091; P<0.01). Results of this study show that ratio of lactulose to D-mannitol in urine reﬂectedthetreatmentbythehighestdoseofIndomethacinandthatthetestmaybe used for determination of IP in preruminant calves.KEY WORDS: intestinal permeability, calves, lactulose/mannitol test, gas liquid chromatography, Indomethacin

Highlights

The small intestine plays an important role as the protective barrier between external and internal environment of the organism
Urine samples taken prior to marker administration were negative for presence of both Dmannitol and lactulose suggesting that diet of calves did not contain these sugars or their sources
Results of our study demonstrate that design of the lactulose/mannitol test as used in humans is applicable to calves

Summary

Introduction

The small intestine plays an important role as the protective barrier between external and internal environment of the organism. Failure of this barrier has great impact on the etiology and pathogenesis of many intestinal diseases. Paracellular permeability of the small intestine may be measured by a simple, noninvasive test based on the simultaneous peroral administration of two molecules of different size such a monosaccharide (e.g., L-rhamnose) or alditol (e.g., D-mannitol), and disaccharide (e.g., lactulose or cellobiose) or 51Cr-EDTA. The principle of the test is based on assumption that 2 types of pores of different size, and differentially permeable to small and large probes, are present in the intestinal mucosa (Hall, 1999). Some authors note even 3 types of pores in intestinal epithelia: 1. small pores up to 0.6 nm localized on the tips of the villi which are permeable only to monosoccharides and alditols, 2. large pores (5-6 nm) permeable to disccharides are localized in the crypts, and 3. the medium-sized pores (1-1.5 nm) are localized at the base of the villi (Melichar et al, 2005)

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