Effect Of Silymarin On Mast Cells During Anaphylaxis In Albino Rats.

1Adel H. Omar, 2Magda Mansour and 3Hassan Abdel-Hady.

Departments of 1Clinical Pharmacology, 2Histology and 3Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Menoufia University, Egypt.

Effects of a naturally occurring flavonoids, silymarin, on mast cells during anaphylaxis were examined in order to assess the potential utility in the treatment of allergic disorders. Forty five male albino rats were used in this study. Five of them were used as controls and the rest were sensitized with egg albumin and complete Freund’s adjuvant. Eight sensitized rats served as sensitized controls and the rest (32 rats) were challenged with a second dose of egg albumin to induce anaphylaxis. These rats were divided into 4 groups (8 rats for each) and received orally saline, silymarin - tragacanth suspension daily for 4 weeks, silymarin-tragacanth suspension single dose and tragacanth mucilage (vehicle), respectively. Results showed that silymarin is an effective anti-anaphylactic drug as shown by its ability to prevent antigen - induced degranulation of the mast cells and the long term oral treatment provided a much more inhibitory effect on mast cell degranulation than that produced by a single oral dose. The anti-anaphylactic properties of silymarin may be ascribed to a membrane stabilizing activity on the mast cells and the probable mechanisms were discussed. On the basis of these data, it is possible to suggest a clinical evaluation of antiallergic activity of silymarin.