The aim of the present work is to detect the effect of colchicine administration on the histology of the liver and intestine in albino rats.
Most drugs have side effects which represent a great problem for human. Some of these side effects may be serious. An example of these drugs is colchicine. Its only approved use is to treat gout, though it is also occasionally used in veterinary medicine to treat cancers in some animals. It is also used as an antimitotic agent in cancer research involving cell cultures. Colchicine was given i.p with a dose of 3mg/kg body weight daily for a period of 5 days. Histological examinations were carried out at one, four and seven days post treatment.
Histological examination of liver one, four and seven days post treatment with colchicine showed sporadic necrosis, loss of hepatic architecture, pyknosis and vacuolations of some hepatocytes, corrugated hepatic portal vein surrounded by large fibrotic area, edema of portal tract with new bile ductules formation, dilatation and congestion of hepatic sinusoids, multihaemorrhagic areas, hypertrophied hepatocytes with deeply stained shrunken nuclei and mononuclear cells infiltration replacing focal areas of hepatic necrosis.
Histological examination of intestine showed no changes one day post treatment with colchicine. At four and seven days post treatment, the intestine revealed hyperplasia and hyperactivation of mucous secreting cells and intestinal glands and mononuclear cells infiltration and edema in lamina propria with multihemorrhagic areas.
In conclusion, the present study has shown that colchicine has a toxic effect and some histopathological changes have been detected, so care should be taken when colchicine is prescribed in gout treatment.