Authors : P.B. Fakunle, A.J. Ajibade, L.O. Ehigie, O.A. Alamu and E.A. Ashamu
Abstract: Alcohol abuse and misuse has been widely reported to impair vision with majority of information available implicating the retina but with very scanty literature laying emphasis on the visual relay centers. Hence, some effects of chronic administration of ethanol was studied on the neuronal cells population in the visual relay centers Lateral Geniculate Body (LGB) and Superior Colliculus (SC) of 40 adult Wistar rats of both sexes grouped into treatments T1 and T2 and controls C1 and C2. The treatment groups received 25% ethanol in 2% sucrose (ad libitum) for 6 weeks except T2 animals that were made to undergo an additional 2 weeks of ethanol withdrawal period while the control groups C1 and C2 received tap water and 2% sucrose solution, respectively for 6 weeks. At the end of administration, the animals were sacrificed and process for routine histological techniques and stained for nissl substances. Body weight loss was significantly (p<0.05) observed as well as significantly (p<0.05) reduced neuronal cells population of 47 and 40% for LGB and 42 and 38% for SC neuronal loss, respectively in treatment groups T1 and T2 compared to control group. Hence, these alterations may again underline visual imbalance associated with the malfunctioning of the visual relay center most especially in the maintenance of saccade and recoding of visual signals which are postretinal related functions.
P.B. Fakunle, A.J. Ajibade, L.O. Ehigie, O.A. Alamu and E.A. Ashamu, 2012. Chronic Ethanol Administration Reduces Neuronal Cells Population in the Lateral Geniculate Body and the Superior Colliculus of Adult Wistar Rats (Rattus norvegicus). Research Journal of Medical Sciences, 6: 56-60.