Abstract
The present study was carried out to assess the oral safety, proinflammatory and stress response effect of Terminalia catappa aqueous leaf extract (TCA) in male Wistar rats. The acute and sub-acute oral toxicity of TCA was assessed using guidelines 423 and 407 of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), respectively. Signs of clinical toxicity, morbidity and mortality were observed. The biochemical, haematological, proinflammatory, stress response and histopathological indices were assessed. In the acute toxicity study, no sign of clinical toxicity, morbidity, and mortality was observed for TCA treatment, up to 5000 mg/kg bwt. However, in the sub-acute toxicity study, repeated daily TCA treatment significantly (p<0.05) altered the body weight gain, plasma alkaline phosphatase activity and albumin concentration. There were no obvious morphological and macroscopic alterations in the organs investigated. TCA appear not to elicit any proinflammatory, stress, systemic and organ toxic effect when utilised at the reported dose and time frame.