Co-administration
of the health food supplement, bovine colostrum, reduces the acute
non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug-induced increase in intestinal
permeability
Playford RJ,
MacDonald CE, Calnan DP, Floyd DN, Podas T, Johnson W, Wicks AC,
Bashir O, Marchbank T.
Department of Gastroenterology, Imperial College School of Medicine,
Hammersmith
Hospital, Du Cane Road, London W120NN, U.K.
Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are effective analgesics
but cause gastrointestinal injury. Present prophylactic measures are
suboptimal and novel therapies are required. Bovine colostrum is a
cheap, readily available source of growth factors, which reduces gastrointestinal
injury in rats and mice. We therefore examined whether spray-dried,
defatted colostrum could reduce the rise in gut permeability (a non-invasive
marker of intestinal injury) caused by NSAIDs in volunteers and patients
taking NSAIDs for clinical reasons. Healthy male volunteers (n=7)
participated in a randomized crossover trial comparing changes in
gut permeability (lactulose/rhamnose ratios) before and after 5 days
of 50 mg of indomethacin three times daily (tds) per oral with colostrum
(125ml, tds) or whey protein (control) co-administration. A second
study examined the effect of colostral and control solutions (125
ml, tds for 7 days) on gut permeability in patients (n=15) taking
a substantial, regular dose of an NSAID for clinical reasons. For
both studies, there was a 2 week washout period between treatment
arms. In volunteers, indomethacin caused a 3-fold increase in gut
permeability in the control arm (lactulose/rhamnose ratio 0.36+/-0.07
prior to indomethacin and 1.17+/-0.25 on day 5, P<0.01), whereas
no significant increase in permeability was seen when colostrum was
co-administered. In patients taking long-term NSAID treatment, initial
permeability ratios were low (0.13+/-0.02), despite continuing on
the drug, and permeability was not influenced by co-administration
of test solutions. These studies provide preliminary evidence that
bovine colostrum, which is already currently available as an over-the-counter
preparation, may provide a novel approach to the prevention of NSAID-induced
gastrointestinal damage in humans.
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