Establishment of trichinella spiralis in balb/c mice treated with lactobacillus casei administered intraperitoneally and orally

Abstract

A comparison of protection conferred against Trichinella spiralis adults by viable Lactobacillus casei administered either intraperitoneally (i.p.) or orally to congenic mice was carried out. Twenty-one adult BALB/c mice were distributed at random in three groups (Lc-IP, LC-O, T). Each mice of the Lc-IP group was i.p. inoculated on day -7 with 1.8 x 109 L. casei organisms, while in group Lc-O each mice was given orally 1.8 x 109 L. casei organisms on days -7, -6, -5, -4, -3, -2 and -1. Rodents in group T weren't given any treatment. On day 0 every animal was inoculated with 500 infective Trichinella spirali larvae and on day 5 all mice were humanely killed in order to determine the number of adult parasites: 181 adults were collected from group T, 102 from group Lc-IP and 97 from group Lc-O. Twenty four hours later, all 181 worms belonging to the control group were mobile, while the 199 (102+97) of the other two groups were not. A 43.6 % (P<0.05) reduction in parasite load relative to the control group for the Lc-IP group and of 46.4 % (P<0.05) for the Lc-O group was determined. These results indicate that viable L. casei administered either orally or i.p. to BALB/c mice produce a significant protective response against Trichinella spiralis.