IN VITRO EFFECT OF SOME IRANIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS ON THE HISTOMONAS MELEAGRIDIS PARASITE

Objective: This study aimed to investigate the in vitro effect of the extracts of five Iranian medicinal herbs on Histomonas meleagridis protozoan parasite. Methods: This study was conducted in the following three phases in Khorramabad, Iran, in 2016: 1) preparing and extracting the 5 medicinal herbs Dracocephalum kotschyi, Satureja khuzestanica, Pulicaria gnaphalodes, Olea europaea, and Echinophora platyloba DC; 2) culturing the positive cases of fecal samples in the fortified commercial medium RPMI₁₆₄₀ up to 1×10⁶ parasite/ml of the parasite; and 3) investigating the effect of 1.25, 2.5, and 5 mg/ml densities of each extract and metronidazole compared with the negative control on hours 2, 4, 6, 24, and 72 with Trypan blue vital stain. Results: In this study, the D. kotschyi extract which destroyed 80% of the parasites in the first two hours was the most, and the S. khuzestanica extract was the second effective extract. However, metronidazole destroyed 60% of the parasites in the first two hours and 100% in the third day and may be excreted before being effective, showing relative resistance. Conclusion: The results of the present study demonstrated that herbal medicines may be a natural source for the production of new agent to treat histomoniasis infection.