Sex differences in animal models: A case of diabetes mellitus herbal treatment

Abstract

Herbal extracts have been used for control of type 2 diabetes mellitus for many centuries and the use of animal models to test the potency of these remedies is imperative. Given that preclinical studies may eventually inform clinical research and therapeutic developments, the impact of sex should be taken into consideration as an important biological variable in order to produce precise and reproducible results applicable to both men and women. This paper sought to find out whether there is sex differentiated outcomes on aherbal treatment for type 2 diabetes mellitus. Alloxan induced diabetic wistar rats were the experimental subjects used in the study. Twenty-eight albino Wistar rats, fourteen males and fourteen females, aged 6-7 weeks and weighing 100-140 grams were subjected to this test. The response of interest was the change in blood glucose level 2 hours after the administration of the herbal treatment. A sharper rise in blood glucose level among the female rats was recorded compared to the males upon ingestion of glucose. On the other hand, the average change in blood glucose level was higher among the male rats compared to the females. This suggested that the course of the diabetes disease and the treatment effect was different in male and female rats. This study recommends the use of both male and female subjects in animal studies at both the experimental and analysis stages for completing the understanding about disease mechanisms and in driving the course of advanced diagnostic and therapeutic approaches.