Qom University of Medical Sciences Journal

Background and Objectives: Epilepsy is associated with daily memory loss, learning, and behavioral disorders. Carbamazepine is an anticonvulsant drug, commonly used in the treatment of generalized tonic-clonic seizures. Wheat germ oil has the highest amount of tocopherol (vitamin E) among all vegetable oils. In this study, the combined effect of wheat germ oil and carbamazepine on improvement of learning and spatial memory, was investigated in mouse epilepsy model.

Methods: To induce chemical kindling, PTZ (40mg/kg bw) was dissolved in normal saline and injected into mice. Also, daily consumption of carbamazepine (at doses of 30 and 180mg/kg) and wheat germ oil, was performed by gavage. Learning and spatial memory of mice, were assessed using a radial maze. To analyze the behavioral data during the test days (4-7), repetitive analysis of variance, was used and to investigate total testing days, one-way ANOVA was used. The hippocampal damage was investigated using hematoxylin and eosin staining. The level of significance was considered as p<0.05.

Results: The results of this study showed that administration of wheat germ oil and 30mg/kg carbamazepine in the epileptic group caused significant improvement in spatial memory and learning compared to the untreated epileptic group.

Conclusion: Wheat germ oil acts as an antioxidant agent and causes improvement in learning and spatial memory through reduction of the free radicals caused by epilepsy and use of carbamazepine.