Arnica Tincture Cures Cutaneous Leishmaniasis in Golden Hamsters

Sara M Robledo, Ivan D Vélez, Thomas J Schmidt, Sara M Robledo, Ivan D Vélez, Thomas J Schmidt

Abstract

In search for potential therapeutic alternatives to existing treatments for cutaneous Leishmaniasis, we have investigated the effect of Arnica tincture Ph. Eur. (a 70% hydroethanolic tincture prepared from flowerheads of Arnica montana L.) on the lesions caused by infection with Leishmania braziliensis in a model with golden hamsters. The animals were treated topically with a daily single dose of the preparation for 28 days. Subsequently, the healing process was monitored by recording the lesion size in intervals of 15 days up to day 90. As a result, Arnica tincture fully cured three out of five hamsters while one animal showed an improvement and another one suffered from a relapse. This result was slightly better than that obtained with the positive control, meglumine antimonate, which cured two of five hamsters while the other three showed a relapse after 90 days. This result encourages us to further investigate the potential of Arnica tincture in the treatment of cutaneous Leishmaniasis.

Keywords: Arnica montana L.; cutaneous Leishmaniasis; neglected tropical disease.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Ultra high performance liquid chromatography/positive mode electrospray ionization quadrupole time of flight tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC/+ ESI QqTOF MSMS) analysis of the investigated Arnica tincture; retention time range relevant for sesquiterpene lactones (STLs). (A) Base peak ion chromatogram (m/z 100–1000); (B) Extracted ion chromatogram m/z 245 [C15H17O3]+, representing the main common fragment of helenalin esters; (C) Extracted ion chromatogram m/z 247 [C15H19O3]+, representing the main common fragment of 11α,13-dihydrohelenalin esters; (D) Extracted ion chromatogram m/z 291 [C17H23O4]+, representing the main common fragment of 2-ethoxy-2,3-dihydrohelenalin esters; (E) Extracted ion chromatogram m/z 293 [C17H25O4]+, representing the main common fragment of 2-ethoxy-2,3,11,13-tetrahydrohelenalin esters. The compounds detected in (D,E) are artefacts known to be formed in Arnica tincture by Michael addition of ethanol to the cyclopentenone unit of the native STLs [8]; for peak identification see Figure 2.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Sesquiterpene lactones identified in the Arnica tincture under study.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Treatment progress of cutaneous leishmaniasis caused by L. braziliensis in one animal (4AE-357-SM-♀ in Table 1). (a) Before treatment (TD0); (b) On day 28 at the end of treatment (TD28); (c) on day 90 post treatment (PTD90).
Figure 4
Figure 4
Effect of treatment in the body weight. Golden hamster (n = 5 each group) were treated with Arnica tincture or meglumine antimoniate (Glucantime®) during four weeks, administered topically or intralesionally, respectively. Untreated hamsters were also supervised during the study. Data represents the mean value ± SD of the weight in grams of hamsters in each experimental group. * p < 0.05.

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