Weight losing, antihyperlipidemic and cardioprotective effects of the alkaloid fraction of Hunteria umbellata seed extract on normal and triton-induced hyperlipidemic rats

Objective: To investigate the weight losing, antihyperlipidemic and cardioprotective effects of the alkaloid fraction of Hunteria umbellata(H. umbellata) seed.Methods: Adult female Wistar rats(weight range: 120-150 g) were randomly divided into 4 and 5 treatment groups in the normal and triton-induced hyperlipidemic models, respectively. and were daily treated for 14 d before they were humanely sacrificed under inhaled diethyl ether anesthesia. About 5 mL of whole blood was obtained by cardiac puncture from each treated rat, from which serum for lipids assay was subsequently separated. Tissue samples of livers of treated rats were harvested and processed for histopathological analysis.Results: Repeated daily oral treatments of normal rats with 25 and 50 mg/kg/day of alkaloid fraction of H. umbellata resulted in significant(P<0.05 and P<0.001) and dose-dependent weight loss, and decreases in the serum triglyceride, total cholesterol and low density lipoprotein cholesterol, while significantly(P<0.001) increased the serum levels of high density lipoprotein cholesterol fraction. Similarly, oral pre-treatments with 25 and 50 mg/kg/day of alkaloid fraction of H. umbellata for 14 d before induction of hyperlipidemia with triton WR-1339 significantly(P<0.01, P<0.001) and dose-dependently attenuated increases in the average body weights, serum levels of triglyceride, total cholesterol and low density lipoprotein cholesterol while also significantly(P<0.01, P<0.001) and dose-dependently attenuated significant(P<0.001) decrease in the serum high-density lipoproteincholesterol levels when compared to the untreated control values. However, the results obtained for 50 mg/kg of alkaloid fraction of H. umbellata in both normal and triton WR-1339-induced hyperlipidemic rats were comparable to that recorded for 20 mg/kg of simvastatin. Similarly, oral pretreatments with 25 and 50 mg/kg/day of alkaloid fraction of H. umbellata significantly improved the histological lesions of fatty hepatic degeneration induced by triton WR-1339 treatment.Conclusions: Overall, results of this study showed that repeated oral treatments with 25 and 50 mg/kg/day of alkaloid fraction of H. umbellata elicited weight losing, antihyperlipidemic and cardioprotective effects in triton WR-1339 induced hyperlipidemic rats that were mediated via de novo cholesterol biosynthesis inhibition.