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Indigenous traditional medicine: in vitro anti-giardial activity of plants used in the treatment of diarrhea

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Abstract

The ethnopharmacology for treatment of parasitic infections facilitates and directs the search for new chemical entities. In this direction, this study evaluated the cytotoxicity in vitro, against trophozoites of Giardia lamblia, of aqueous extracts of leaves Achyrocline satureioides (Lam.) DC., barks of Eugenia uniflora L., aerial parts of Foeniculum vulgare Miller, and barks of Psidium guajava L. These plants are traditionally used for the treatment of diarrhea by the indigenous population Mbyá-Guarani, located at the Lomba do Pinheiro, Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. The in vitro susceptibility qualitative analysis of G. lamblia to aqueous extracts was performed in serial dilutions from 2.5 to 0.02 mg/mL. Results revealed the minimal inhibitory concentrations: 0.313 mg/mL for A. satureioides and E. uniflora, 0.02 mg/mL for P. guajava, and F. vulgare did not present any cytotoxic effect. Quantitative assays of viable trophozoites, showed that A. satureioides presented the highest cytotoxic effect (93.5%), followed by P. guajava (82.2%), and E. uniflora (67.3%). Indigenous Guarani use mainly A. satureioides for the treatment of diarrhea, revealing the conformity with results obtained in vitro. Bioguided assays are necessary to identify the compounds responsible for the activity of the aqueous extract of A. satureioides.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Chieftain José Cirilo Pires Morinico (tribe Mbyá-Guarani), for making possible the accomplishment of this study and for the valuable information, Dr. Lilian Mentz (Departamento de Botânica, IB, UFRGS), for her assistance at the herbarium, and to Dr. Tatiane da Silva, (Faculdade de Farmácia, UFRGS), for loaning SPSS software. This study received financial support from FAPERGS (Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil), grant 0522751, and TWAS (Trieste, Italy), grant 06-328.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratório de Pesquisa em Parasitologia, Faculdade de Farmácia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Av. Ipiranga 2752, 90610-000, Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil

    Clara Lia Costa Brandelli & Tiana Tasca

  2. Laboratório de Farmacognosia, Faculdade de Farmácia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Av. Ipiranga 2752, 90610-000, Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil

    Raquel Brandt Giordani

  3. Instituto de Geriatria e Gerontologia, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul, Av. Ipiranga 6690, CEP 90610-000, Porto Alegre, RS, Brazil

    Geraldo Attilio De Carli

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  1. Clara Lia Costa Brandelli
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  2. Raquel Brandt Giordani
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  3. Geraldo Attilio De Carli
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  4. Tiana Tasca
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Correspondence to Tiana Tasca.

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Brandelli, C.L.C., Giordani, R.B., De Carli, G.A. et al. Indigenous traditional medicine: in vitro anti-giardial activity of plants used in the treatment of diarrhea. Parasitol Res 104, 1345–1349 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-009-1330-3

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