An aqueous extract of the green leafy vegetable Ipomoea aquatica is as effective as the oral hypoglycaemic drug tolbutamide in reducing the blood sugar levels of Wistar rats

This study was undertaken to compare the oral hypoglycaemic activity of an aqueous extract of the green leafy vegetable Ipomoea aquatica (dose equival ent to 3.3 g starting material /kg body weight) with that of the known oral hypoglycaemic drug tolbutamide (15 mg/kg body weight) in glucose challenge d Wistar rats (3 g/kg body weight, administered 30 min after the administra tion of Ipomoea aquatica or tolbutamide). One and half hours after administ ration of glucose (equivalent to 2 h after administration of plant extract or tolbutamide), the mean blood glucose level of the Ipomoea aquatica treat ed group was 47.5% lower than that of the control group treated with distil led water. The tolbutamide treated group showed a mean blood glucose level which was only 33.8% lower than that of the control group. However, statist ical analysis indicated that the blood glucose levels of the Ipomoea aquati ca treated group were not significantly different from that of the tolbutam ide treated group. Our results show that the aqueous extract of Ipomoea aqu atica is as effectve as tolbutamide in reducing the blood glucose levels of glucose-challenged Wistar rats. Copyrigh (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.