Study of oxidative-stress in rifampicin-induced hepatic injury in growin rats with and without protein-energy malnutrition

1 Rifampicin (RMP) induced hepatic injury was investi gated in growing rats. The interaction of moderate and severe protein-energy malnutrition (PEM) was also investigated.

2 Status of oxidative/antioxidative profile was studied by the mechanistic approach, to enumerate the nature of injury.

3 Successful hepatic injury in rats was produced by giving intraperitoneal injection of RMP (50 mg/kg/ day).

4 Hepatic lipid peroxidation was significantly increased in all the RMP treated rats.

5 Superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione per oxidase activities in the hepatic tissue decreased with RMP treatment.

6 Hepatic thiols represented as total and protein-bound thiols, showed significant elevation, whereas the non protein thiols remain unchanged with RMP treatment.

7 Glutathione-S-transferases also showed significant elevation against 1,2-dichloro-4 nitrobenzene (DCNB) and ethacrynic acid (EA) as substrates.

8 The oxidative/antioxidative profile was observed to be more severely affected with coexistence of malnutri tion.

9 Histopathological correlation showed an additional fatty infiltration of hepatocytes with coexistence of malnutrition.

10 Thus, in conclusion, it can be speculated that an altered oxidative/antioxidative profile is the closely associated with production of RMP induced hepatic injury.