Abstract

Background: Herbal formulations are frequently recommended in day to day clinical practice for therapeutic purposes by many Siddha practitioners. However, the safety of Siddha herbal drugs remains a challenge whencommunicatinginto the scientific community because of the high variability of phyto-chemical components involved. Objective: To investigate the acute and subacute oral toxicity of Karunjeeraga chooranam in adult female wistar rat models. Materials and Methods: In acute oral toxicity study, Karumjeeragachooranam were administered orally initially at the dose of 50 mg/kg/body weight which was increased up to 2000mg/kg/body weight and animals were observed for toxic symptoms till 14 days as per the OECD-423 guidelines. For subacute toxicity study, the Karunjeeragachooranam were administered for 20 days,as per the OECD guidelines-423with the doses of 50 mg, 100 mg, 200 mg and 400 mg/kg/ body weight for different groups. At the end of 20th day, the animals were sacrificed and toxicity parameters were assessed. Biochemical analysis on blood samples and histopathological evaluation of different organswere also performed to assess any toxicity. Results: In acute toxicity study, no mortality wasfound at a dose of 2000 mg/kg .So the dose is taken as oral LD50 of Karunjeeragachooranam. The administration of drugat varied dosesupto 400mg/kg/body weightfor20 days did not produce any significant change in haematological and biochemical parameters of wistar rats as compared to normal control group. No pathological changes were observed in histology of various organs of treated rats ascompared to normal control animals. Conclusion: The Karunjeeragachooranam wasfound to besafe when administered to adult wistar rat modelsfor longer duration and in maximal LD50 doses.