A pancreatic extract-enriched diet improves the nutritional status of agedrats

Correction of the malnourished state, particularly common and severe in eld erly people, is often unsuccessful. To improve the efficiency of realimenta tion, we evaluated the nutritional effect of a pancreatic extract (PE)-enri ched diet in malnourished aged rats. Sprague-Dawley male rats were randomly assigned to 6 groups as follows: 1 group of control rats had free access t o the diet for 12 wk (C group) and 5 groups were 50% food restricted for th e same period, One food-restricted group was then killed (R group) and the 4 remaining groups were refed for 1 wk using a standard diet enriched eithe r with two different doses of a pancreatic extract (2.4 or 4.8 g/d in PE1 a nd PE2 groups, respectively) or with an isonitrogenous casein hydrolysate ( CH1 and CH2 groups, respectively). Profound alterations induced by food res triction (FR) were moderately corrected by refeeding, except nitrogen balan ce, which was reestablished in rats refed ail diets (P < 0.01- vs, R), Supp lementation of the food ration with a pancreatic extract clearly improved r ecovery. Indeed, body weight gain, both jejunal and ileal trophicity [jejun um: total height, PE2: 849 +/- 45 <mu>m vs. CH2: 768 +/- 17 mum (P < 0.05); protein content, PE2: 69.9 +/- 5.7 mg vs. CH2: 56.4 +/- 4.8 mg (P < 0.01)] and nonspecific immune response in terms of H2O2 production by polymorphon uclear neutrophils and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha) by macrophag es (PE2, 20.7 +/- 4.7 vs. CH2, 8.7 +/- 2.3, P < 0.05) were improved in rats fed PE2. A pancreatic extract could improve the efficiency of realimentati on in malnourished aged rats.