Asian Pacific Journal of Tropical Biomedicine
In vitro assessment of the synergism between extracts of Cocos nucifera husk and some standard antibiotics
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Abstract:
Objective: To evaluate the interactions between the crude extracts of Cocos nucifera (C. nucifera) and six front line antibiotics (ampicillin sodium salt, penicillin G sodium, amoxicillin, chloramphenicol, ciprofloxacin and tetracycline hydrochloride), against some bacterial pathogens linked with human infection. Methods: The pulverized husk of C. nucifera was dissolved in 95% n-hexane and extracted using Soxhlet extraction method and sterile distilled water (aqueous). The antibacterial susceptibility of the crude extracts of C. nucifera was tested against envi- ronmental and clinical strains (6) obtained from the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS), Vibrio (6) and Listeria pathogens (6). The agar-well diffusion method was used for screening the extracts for their antibacterial activity. The minimum inhibitory con- centration and minimum bactericidal concentration of the extracts were determined. Time-kill assay was used to evaluate bactericidal and/or bacteriostatic activity. The synergistic effect of the crude extracts and antibiotics was assessed and evaluated by adopting the checkerboard methods. Results: With the time-kill assay, the highest bactericidal activity was observed on Vibrio fluvialis EL041 with a −5.6 ± 0.2 log 10 CFU/mL decrease in cell density as a result of the combination of the extracts and chloramphenicol at two-fold minimum inhibitory concentrations. Synergisms using the time-kill assay constituted about 72%, while indifference constituted about 28%. The checkerboard method revealed synergistic interaction in 67% of the combinations, and indifference in 33%. There was no specificity in the observed synergy to a particular class of antibiotics. Conclusions: This investigation suggests the crude extracts of C. nucifera to be a po- tential broad spectrum antimicrobial compound. Therefore, further study is needed to isolate the pure compounds from these crude extracts.
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