Diabetes and Its Complication: Aqueous Leaf Extract of Alafia barteri Maintained the Pancreatic and Gastric Integrity in Allosan Induced Diabetic Rats (Rattus novergicus)

Alafia barteri, Apocynaceae has been valued for its efficiency in traditional medicine system in Nigeria and other African countries, as an anti-inflammatory and fever remedy. This study was carried out to know the effect of Alafia barteri leaf extract on the histo-architecture of the pancreas and stomach in Alloxan induced diabetic wistar rats. A total of Twenty (20) Wistar rats were used for this study, animals were randomly selected into Four (4) groups of Five (5) animals and were acclimatized for period of Two (2) weeks Group 1 the Control Group (CG) received 2mls of distilled water, Group 2 Normoglycemic Treated (NT) with 400 mg/kg of Alafia barteri aqueous leaf extract, Group 3 Induced Hyperglycaemic Untreated (IU), and Group 4 Induced Hyperglycaemic Treated (IT) with 400 mg/kg of Alafia barteri aqueous leaf extract. Hyperglycaemic was induced in Groups 3 and 4 by a single dose of intraperitoneal injection of Alloxan at 120 mg/kg. Administration was done for period of nine (9) weeks of experiment; animals were euthanized by cervical dislocation. Pancreas and stomach were excised following abdominal incision and fixed in 10% formol saline for histological studies using H/E and Masson Trichrome stains. Aqueous leaf extract of Alafia barteri caused significant reduction (p-value