Evaluation of the Trichomonocidal And Cytotoxic Activities of Some Selected Nigerian Medicinal Plants

Human trichomoniasis is a widely prevalent sexually transmitted disease of worldwide importance with possibilities of severe symptoms but there are usual reports of resistance to the common 4-nitroimidazoles prescribed for the treatment especially in prolonged cases. Six medicinal plants were selected in this work to assess their potentials as alternative antitrichomonal remedies. The objectives were to evaluate the cytotoxicity capacities of the extracts and their biocidal activities on Trichomonas gallinae . Culture of T. gallinae was aliquoted into micro-titer plate wells together with graded concentrations of the plant extracts. The cytotoxicity assay was performed using formaldehyde-fixed erythrocytes which were added to serially diluted plant extracts in micro-titer plate wells. Observation of motile trichomonads was made after 12 and 24 h incubation at 37oC. Observation of haemagglutination in the wells was then made after 1h. The minimum lethal concentrations (MLC) obtained for Cissampelos owariensis, Ancylobosthrys a moe na leaf, Enantia chloranth aand Hydrolea palustr isat 24 h are 4.7, 150, 9.4 and 4.7 mg/ml respectively. With A. amoena twig, Lecaniodiscus cupanioid es and Aloe macrocarpa, values obtained were 9.4, 9.4 and 75 mg/kg at 24 hr. Metronidazole, the standard drug exhibited MLC of 0.47 mg/ml at 24 h. A. amoen a exhibited the lowest haemagglutination titre values with the leaf and twig extracts having 0.03 and 0.05 respectively, while C. owariensis (0.85) and H. palustris (0.85) exhibited the highest. A value of 0.00 was obtained for Metronidazole. The results obtained imply that the plants of study can be adopted for treatment of trichomoniasis