Malva sylvestris L. Protects from Fluoride Nephrotoxicity in Rat

Malva sylvestris L. (M. sylvestris) has antioxidant property and is widely used in the traditional medicine to treat gastrointestinal, respiratory, skin and urological disorders.
In this study, the protective effect of M. sylvestris against sodium fluoride-induced nephrotoxicity in the rat was evaluated.
The M. sylvestris flower extract was prepared and injected intraperitoneally at the doses of 100, 200, 400 mg/kg/day to rat groups (10 in each group) for 1 week and subsequently 600 ppm sodium fluoride was added to the rats drinking water for 1 additional week. After these steps, the rat serum levels of urea, creatinine, reduced glutathione, catalase and malondialdehyde were determined. The histopathology of the rats’ kidney was also studied. In this study, vitamin C (10 mg/kg/day) was used as positive control.
Sodium fluoride administration increased levels of BUN, creatinine, glutathione, catalase activity and decreased malondialdehyde levels indicating induction of nephrotoxicity in the rats. M. sylvestris extract pretreatment significantly decreased the BUN and creatinine levels (P The results suggest that M. sylvestris has protective effects against sodium fluoride-induced nephrotoxicity which maybe mediated by the antioxidant activity of the plant flavonoids.