Abstract:
This study was applied on a
total number of 40 native breed lambs from
Dakahlia governorate, their ages being
ranged from 5 to 26 days, in order to declare
the effects of nutritional muscular dystrophy
as an oxidative stress in lambs and the effect
of vitamin C administration in enhancing
the treatment of Nutritional Muscular
Dystrophy (NMD), decreasing oxidative
stress and their correlation with glutathione
in diseased lambs. The used lambs were
allotted into four groups. Group 1 included
apparently clinically healthy animals (n-10)
and was the control group. The 2nd group
(suffering from NMD) was treated by
Vitamin E–selenium alone (n-10). The 3rd
group (suffering from NMD) was treated by
vitamin E –selenium and vitamin C (n-10)
and the 4th group (suffering from NMD) was
treated by vitamin C only (n-10). Two blood
samples were obtained from each lamb,
before and after treatment, and subjected to
the laboratory investigation. The results
revealed that there was significant increase
in the oxidative stress markers with
significant reduction in the antioxidant
levels of diseased lambs. After the
treatment, there were improvement of the
general health condition and disappearance
of the clinical signs within 4-7 days in group
2 and group 3, in contrast with the 4th group
in which the clinical signs persisted even
after treatment. The obtained results
concerning blood and serum biochemical
analysis revealed that NMD was playing an
important role as an oxidative stressor in
lambs. Moreover, antioxidant mixture of
vitamin E-selenium and ascorbate proved to
be more powerful and effective in the
treatment of diseased lambs with NMD and
decreasing the resulted oxidative stress.
