Canadian Journal of Pure & Applied Sciences

Abstract: Present study deals to find out the effects of two herbal weight reducing drugs Phytolacca Americana (PA) and Phytolacca Berry (PB) on plasma electrolytes in common rabbits followed by the induction of hypercholesterolemia. In PA garlic, bladder wrack and grapefruit are the additional ingredients to poke weed while PB has poke weed only. Test animals of two groups were orally administrated PA and PB in doses of 33.3 mg/day and 1.15 mg/day respectively, for 37 days. Blood samples drawn on day 0, 3, 9, 14, 21, 27 and 37 were used to measure plasma Sodium (Na+ ), Potassium (K+ ) and Calcium (Ca++). Both herbal drugs maintained plasma Na+ to normal levels while plasma K+ concentration that remained low returned to normal after four weeks of treatment, significantly (p<0.05) depending on the duration of drug administrated. However, PA effectively returned the very high Ca++ concentration to normal level within one week of treatment whereas PB achieved the same normal level after three weeks of treatment. Thus it may be concluded that both weight reducing herbal drugs although maintained the plasma Na+, K+ and Ca++ concentrations to normal levels when administrated for more than five weeks, showed pronounced alterations in plasma concentrations of K+ and Ca++ during early period of treatment. This effect might be attributed to the interference of drugs with Na+-K+ ATPase activity or blocking the Ca++ channels at the cellular level.