HISTOLOGICAL STUDY OF TOXIC EFFECTS OF PARACETAMOL ON THE CEREBRUM OF ADULT FEMALE WISTAR RATS

Paracetamol (Acetaminophen) is a major ingredient in numerous cold and flu remedies, but if administrated for long period, it produced a massive necrosis on chronic low dose or acute overdose. Therefore, the present experiment was undertaken to determine the effects of an oral intake of paracetamol on the cerebral cortex of adult female wistar rats. Sixteen (16) female wistar rats were randomly divided into two groups (A–B) of eight(8) rats each. Group A rats served as control and were given distilled water and group B fed 4mg/kg bodyweight of paracetamol for fourteen (14) consecutive days. At the end of the 14days experiment, the body weight to fall animals was recorded, sacrificed then the cerebra tissue were removed. The cerebra tissue were collected after sacrifice and fixed in 10% formolcalcium and subsequently processed for histological observation using Hematoxylin and Eosin staining principle. The histological section of the control rat showed normal arrangement of the molecular layer with neuro-glial cells, the external granular layer with granular cells and the external pyramidal layer with small and medium sized pyramidal cells. The cerebral section of paracetamol treated rats showed disruption of normal arrangement of cell layers, severe degeneration of neurons and vacuolations of the cells of the cerebrum. The study revealed that paracetamol intake caused deleterious effects on rat’s cerebrum which was evidenced in histological changes. It could be concluded that dioxin exposure causes neurotoxicity on cerebral cyto-architecture, which could serve as basis for some cerebral lesion s i n individuals who abuse paracetamol.