Comparison of the effects of thymoquinone and silymarin on the brain of rats having ischemia-reperfusion in the lower extremities Ann Ital Chir - Epub Ahead of Print, 2019, 8 - 19 November 1 Ann Ital Chir, Digital Edition 2019; 8 pii: S0003469X19029051 Epub Ahead of Print - November 19 free reading: www.annitalchir.com Pervenuto in Redazione Luglio 2018. Accettato per la pubblicazione Ottobre 2018. Correspondence to: Hamza KARABA 1 , Department of Neurosurgery, Faculty of Medicine, Harran University, Sanliurfa, Turkey (e-mail: ham- zakarabag@yahoo.com) Hamza Karabag*, Sezen Koçarslan** *Department of Neurosurgery, Faculty of Medicine, Harran University, Sanliurfa, Turkey **Department of Pathology, Faculty of Medicine, Sütçü İmam University, Kahramanmaraş, Turkey Comparison of the effects of thymoquinone and silymarin on the brain of rats having ischemia-reper- fusion in the lower extremities AIM: We aimed to show whether ischemia reperfusion (I/R) injury causes damage on brain or not, and whether thy- moquinone and silymarin, as antioxidant and anti-infammatory herbs, have benefcial efects on this damage or not. METHODS: Forty Wistar albino rats were carried out and were randomized to 4 groups with equal numbers (n=10): sham group, implemented of only anesthesia; control group, implemented of anesthesia and I/R injury; silymarin group, implemented of anesthesia and I/R injury and treated with a dose of 200 milligram/kg silymarin ip and thymoquinone group, implemented of anesthesia and I/R injury and treated with a dose of 20 mg/kg thymoquinone. Serum lipid hydroperoxide (LOOH) and total free sulfhydryl (Sh) levels were determined. Light microscopy was used to evaluate his- tological changes in brain tissue. RESULTS: Serum LOOH levels (0.21 ± 0.04 for control group, 0.29 ± 0.01 for sham group, 0.23 ± 0.09 for sily- marin group, 0.29 ± 0.09 for thymoquinone group) were signifcantly higher and Sh levels (10.74 ± 1.71 for control group, 6.82 ± 0.24 for sham group, 9.12 ± 1.04 for silymarin group, 8.41 ± 1.12 for thymoquinone group) were sig- nifcantly lower in control, silymarin and thymoquinone groups compared to control group (p<0.05 for all). According to the histopathologic damage score assessment, it was seen that the damage decreased signifcantly in the silymarin and the thymoquinone groups. CONCLUSION: We showed that tissue damage also occurs in brain following the ischemia reperfusion. It was shown that thymoquinone and silymarin is quite efective in preventing this damage. KEY WORDS: Brain, Hydroperoxide levels, Ischemia reperfusion injury, Sulfhydryl levels, Silymarin, Tymoquinone sion, traumatic vascular surgery or abdominal aorta aneurism 6 . In such cases, even when the blood supply of the tissue remaining ischemic is promoted again, dam- ages occur in distant organs due to physiopathologic alterations ingenerating in the organ remaining ischemic, and this is called ischemia-reperfusion injury. Ischemia- reperfusion injury hinges upon the reactive oxygen metabolites that occur depending on the hypoxia in tis- sues remaining in ischemia and infammatory leucocytes to participate in circulation and the destruction created by these metabolites in distant organs 2 . Distant organ damages were shown in many organs (lungs, heart, kidney and intestinal organs) because of the I/R injury 6 . Furthermore, many bio-active agents were used to prevent the I/R injury. We couldn’t fnd Introduction Ischemia reperfusion injury (I/R) is a complex case that is encountered during many surgical interventions, where surgical interventions are implemented by clamping the aorta, such as lower extremity surgery practiced with tourniquet, or vascular surgery arising from arterial occlu- Digital Edition e-publish on-line ISSN 2239-253X Direttore Nicola Picardi READ-ONLY COPY PRINTING PROHIBITED