Effect of Honey Intake on Liver Enzymes and Functions

Background and Objective: honey is consumed both as food and medicine. It is used as alternative medicine to treat burns, cuts, and abscesses in ancient time. It suffered a setback in modern medicine as alternative medicine as it lacked systematic scientific studies. It gained acceptance following its effectiveness where conventional treatments failed. There is a paucity of reports on the effect of honey on liver enzymes and functions. This is aimed at investigating the effect of honey on liver enzymes and function. Methodology: The animals were separated into 4 groups (n=5). Groups 1 and 2 served as control and were fed with normal rat chow and water. Groups 3 and 4 served as test groups and were fed with rat chow, water, and honey. The animals were sacrificed at the end of 20 weeks. Sera from groups 1and 3 were collected for enzymes determination while bile from groups 2 and 4 was collected after laparotomy and common bile duct cannulation under anesthesia for biochemical analyses Results: showed that honey has no significant effects on liver enzymes and bile bilirubin levels (P>0.05). Bile secretion rate was significantly reduced in the test compared with control (P<0.05). Bile Na+, HCO3- were not significantly different while bile K+, CL-were significantly reduced in the test compared with control (P<0.05). Bile cholesterol was significantly increased in the test compared with control(P<0.05) while plasma cholesterol was significantly reduced in the test compared with control(P<0.05). Conclusion: It is therefore concluded that honey did not affect liver enzymes concentration, decreased rate of bile secretion, reduced bile potassium and chloride excretion, increased bile cholesterol excretion and reduced plasma cholesterol level.