ABSTRACT:
Helminthiasis causes a large threatening to the public health and lead to the prevalence of malnutrition, anemia, eosinophilia and pneumonia in developing countries. Due to the high cost of currently available anthelmintic drugs and also the gastro-intestinal helminthes becomes resistant to the drugs; the research on herbal remedies as alternative anthelmintics has been increased. The present study was aimed to assess the anthelmintic activity of the plant, Lindernia madayiparense against Indian earthworms, Pheretima posthuma. Different extracts were prepared using decoction and continuous hot extraction methods. Preliminary qualitative analysis was carried out on all the extracts of L. madayiparanse to identify the presence of phytochemical constituents. Among the extracts tested, ethanol extract showed excellent anthelmintic activity as well as higher than other extracts at all the concentrations against the earth worms and well comparable with standard drug, Albendazole. All the extracts tested exhibited a dose dependent paralytic effect and the time of death. From these findings it was suggested that the observed anthelmintic activity might be due to the presence of these secondary metabolites such as alkaloids, flavanoids, terpenoids, tannins and saponins.