Abstract

Hypoglycemic and hypolipidemic activities of Cephalotaxus sinensis extracts were studiedin streptozotocin-induced diabetic rats. The animals were divided into normal control, diabetic control, diabetic treated and control treated group (n = 6). Effect of oral administration of 80% aqueous ethanolic extract (aq.EE), water extract (WtE), ethyl acetate fraction (EaF), and butanol fraction (BtF) of C. sinensis (200 mg/kg) based on the body weight for 28 days, level of blood glucose, total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) were determined. It was found that the ethyl acetate fraction of C. sinensis significantly lowered the elevated blood glucose level, cholesterol, triglycerides, LDL-C, and it showed a significant increase in body weight and HDL-C level (p<0.01). These results obviously indicated that C. sinensis possesses promising hypoglycemic and hypolipidemic effects, which could exert a beneficial action against high glucose level as well as reduced effect on HDL.

Key words: Cephalotaxus sinensis, hypoglycemic, hypolipidemic.