The Effects of Indomethacin of the Rat Gastric Mucosa

Indomethacin is used widely in clinics nowadays and the side effect of ulceration is well known. This experiment was performed to Study the morphological and histochemical changes on gastric mucosa after indomethacin treatment.

The microscopic finding of the mucosa was observed following oral administration of 10 mg/kg indomethacin in alcohol as solvent. The histological changes were observed from 6 hours after administration of indomethacin and the maxima1 injury was found at 24 hours. Structural changes of injury included hemorrhage, epithelial desquamation and inflammatory cell infiltration.

From the 3 day specimens, regeneration signs had started and in the 6 day specimens almost complete recovery of the mucosal epithelium was noted. The histochemical changes of the mucus were also observed from the 6 hr specimens. As far as neutral glycoprotein was concerned, the decrease was most significant in the 3 day o1d group, and besides, they showed minimal reaction to PAS stain.

For acidic mucus, the decrease was significant in the 24 hr group and the 3 day group showed minimal reaction to Alcian blue stain. It was noted that these changes of the mucus had recovered 6 days after the administration of indomethacin.