The Effect of 99 Percent Edible Bird's Nest (EBN) Extract Suplementation on Serum Interleukin-1 Beta (IL-1?) Levels in Health Workers Treating Covid-19 Cases in Dr. Soetomo General Hospital

Abstract

EBN effectively inhibits the increase of proinflammatory cytokines (TNF?, IL-1?, and IL-6) due to lipopolysaccharide (LPS) administration in mice. Several reviews describe the positive immunomodulating effect of EBN on the respiratory tract and lungs against viral infections. There have been no in vivo studies in humans regarding the effects of EBN supplementation with 99% levels. This study was conducted to determine the effect of EBN supplementation on serum IL-1? levels of health workers at Dr Soetomo Hospital who handle COVID-19 cases. This can be preliminary research in efforts to prevent COVID-19 infection in medical personnel. The research was conducted pre-experimentally to health workers. All subjects were checked for initial serum IL-1? levels and were given 99% EBN supplementation for 14 days. All subjects were observed and checked for serum IL-1? levels after 14 days of EBN supplementation. Of the 50 research subjects, 58% were female, with a mean age of 37 years. The frequency of study subjects who experienced an increase, decrease, and no change in serum IL-1? levels after 14 days of 99% EBN supplementation were 22%, 72%, and 6%, respectively. The median serum IL-1? level of research subjects before 14 days of 99% EBN supplementation was 0.197 pg/ml (min ? max: 0.097?1.107). The median after 14 days of EBN supplementation was 0.178 (min?max: 0.091?0.446) pg/ml. The results of the Wilcoxon difference test showed that there was a significant difference in IL-1? before and after 99% EBN supplementation with p = 0.001 (p <0.05 was considered significant). In summary, there was a significant difference between serum IL-1? levels of research subjects before and after 14 days of 99% EBN supplementation (p = 0.001). EBN 99% has the effect of reducing serum IL-1? levels in healthcare workers who handle Covid-19 cases at RSUD Dr. Soetomo Surabaya.