effects of aqueous extract of berberis integerrima root on some physiological parameters in streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats

diabetes mellitus is a common endocrine disorder. anti-diabetic agents from natural and synthetic sources are available for the treatment of this disease. berberis integerrima is a medicinal shrub used in conventional therapy for a number of diseases. the aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of aqueous extract of berberis integerrima root (aebi) on some physiological parameters in normal and streptozotocin-induced (stz-induced) diabetic male wistar rats. stz-induced diabetic rats showed significant increases in the levels of blood glucose, triglycerides (tg), total cholesterol (tc), low density lipoprotein ldl-cholesterol (ldl-c), creatinine (cr), urea, alanine aminotransferase (alt), aspartate aminotransferase (ast), alkaline phosphatase (alp), total bilirubin while body weight, high density lipoprotein hdl-cholesterol (hdl-c) and total protein levels were significantly decreased compared to normal rats. treatment of diabetic rats with different doses of aqueous extract of berberis integerrima root (250 and 500 mg/kg bw) resulted in a significant decrease in blood glucose, triglycerides, cholesterol, ldl-cholesterol, alt, ast, alp, total bilirubin, creatinine and urea while hdl-cholesterol and total protein levels were markedly increased after six weeks compared to untreated diabetic rats. the effects of the aebi at dose of 500 mg/kg in all parameters except blood glucose (similar) is more than to the standard drug, glibenclamide (0.6 mg/kg, p.o.). the results of this study indicate that the tested aqueous extract of berberis integerrima root possesses hypoglycemic, hypolipidemic and antioxidant effects in stz-induced diabetic rats.