Biochemical changes in blood and tissues of Wistar rats following administration of anti-tuberculosis drugs

Tuberculosis (TB) remains a major public health problem worldwide especially in resource-limited countries of Africa and Asia. The disease is curable with drugs but information on biochemical changes and oxidative indices due to anti-TB drugs is not readily available. This study was designed to investigate in vivo effects of anti-TB drugs in male Wistar rats. Fourteen adult male rats were randomly divided into two groups of seven animals each. The first group served as the control and was given normal saline while the second group received isoniazid (INH), rifampicin (RIF), pyrazinamide (PZA) and ethambutol (ETB) in combination. The drugs were dissolved in normal saline and therapeutic doses [INH (5 mg/kg), RIF (10 mg/kg), PZA (15 mg/kg) and ETB (15 mg/kg)] were given by oral gavage thrice in a week for eight consecutive weeks. Estimation of serum enzymes and other biochemical parameters were assayed by standard methods. Results indicate that there was an insignificant increase in final body weight of anti-TB treated animals relative to the control (p>0.05).  In addition, there were significant decrease in renal and cardiac glutathione-s- transferase activities in the treated group relative to the control (p 0.05). These findings suggest that anti-TB drugs induce redox imbalance resulting in the depletion of enzymatic antioxidant parameters in rats.     Key word: Biochemical, blood, tissue, Wistar rats, Anti-TB drugs.