Albendazole nanocrystals in experimental alveolar echinococcosis: Enhanced chemoprophylactic and clinical efficacy in infected mice

PENSEL, P; PAREDES, A.; ALBANI, C. ; ALLEMANDI, D.; SANCHEZ BRUNI S.; PALMA S.; ELISSONDO, C.

VETERINARY PARASITOLOGY

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2018 vol. 251 p. 78 - 84

0304-4017

Human alveolar echinococcosis is caused by the fox tapeworm Echinococcus multilocularis and is usually fatal ifleft untreated. Medical treatment with albendazole (ABZ) remains an effective option. However, due to its lowaqueous solubility, ABZ is poorly and erratically absorbed following oral administration resulting in low druglevels in plasma and liver distribution. Thus, there arises the need to find a simple, efficient and scalable methodto produce new ABZ formulations with increased bioavailability. Bearing this in mind, ABZ nanocrystals (ABZNCs)appears to be a useful tool to achieve this goal. The aim of the current study was to investigate thechemoprophylactic and clinical efficacy of an ABZ-NC formulation on mice infected with E. multilocularis. In thechemoprophylactic efficacy study, mean weight of the cysts recovered from the ABZ-NC group was 50% lowerthan that recorded from untreated mice, whereas the treatment with ABZ suspension did not show preventiveeffect. The viability of protoscoleces isolated from ABZ-NC treated mice was significantly lower than controlgroups. In the clinical efficacy studies, both ABZ formulations resulted in a reduction in the mean weight of thecysts obtained from mice, however only the treatment with the nanosuspension revealed significant differences(P< 0.05) compared to the control groups. Treatment with ABZ-NCs reduced the weight of the cysts by 77%and the viability of their protoscoleces to 34%. All these results coincided with the tissue damage determined atthe ultrastructural level. The enhanced chemoprophylactic and clinical efficacy of ABZ-NCs observed in thisstudy could be attributed to an increase in the oral bioavailability of the drug. In a next step, we will characterizethe cyst concentration profile after the administration of ABZ-NCs in mice infected with E. multilocularis.