Abstract
Abstract Bone loss leading to osteopenia and osteoporosis is a frequent secondary complication of diabetes. This study aimed to evaluate the value of a traditionally used ‘anti-diabetic’ polyherbal mixture as a possible remedy for the prevention of this complication. Diabetes was induced in Wistar female rats with a single intraperitoneal injection of alloxan monohydrate. The animals with blood glucose higher than 20 mmol/L for 14 consecutive days were considered diabetic. For the next 14 days, animals were treated with two concentrations of the polyherbal mixture (10 and 20 g of dry plant material/ kg). Bone histopathology was evaluated using the H&E and Masson’s trichrome staining. Alloxan-induced diabetes triggered bone histological changes characteristic for the development of osteopenia and osteoporosis and treatment with the polyherbal decoction restored these histopathological changes of the bones to the healthy animal level. At the same time, treatment with these tested doses has shown no adverse effects. These findings suggest that this mixture might be used as a remedy for the prevention of diabetic bone loss.
Highlights
Diabetes mellitus is a chronic metabolic disease where lack of insulin and/or insulin resistance results in constant hyperglycaemia, accumulation of advanced glycation end-products (AGE), excessive production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), and chronic inflammation [1,2,3]
The prevalence of osteoporosis rapidly increases with age in both type 1 and type 2 diabetic patients and this incidence is higher in menopausal women than in men [24]
Treatment with the tested polyherbal mixture decoction produced no changes in the size of the healthy animals bone area (Figure 1C) or osteocyte lacunar area (Figure 1E)
Summary
Diabetes mellitus is a chronic metabolic disease where lack of insulin and/or insulin resistance results in constant hyperglycaemia, accumulation of advanced glycation end-products (AGE), excessive production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), and chronic inflammation [1,2,3]. Together with elevated levels of AGE and ROS cause a decrease in bone mineralization and osteocyte differentiation as well as an increase in apoptosis of osteocytes, decrease of bone collagen and, accelerated bone resorption [1,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12]. Over time, these pathological conditions may result in the development of osteopenia and osteoporosis [13,14,15,16]. The prevalence of osteoporosis rapidly increases with age in both type 1 and type 2 diabetic patients and this incidence is higher in menopausal women than in men [24]
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