Vitamin A supplementation ameliorates butyric acid-induced intestinal mucosal injury in newborn rats

Vitamin A (vit A) plays an important role in wound healing and therefore may help in repairing of intestinal mucosal injury. The purpose of this study was to determine if vit A supplementation could promote healing in intestinal mucosal injury as commonly seen in neonatal necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC). Mild intestinal mucosal injury was induced in 10-day-old Sprague-Dawley rats by luminal administration of 1.5 % butyric acid (BA) at pH 4.0. Normal saline at the same pH was administered as control. Immediately after administrations of BA or normal saline, animals were randomly assigned to receive high dose vit A (20,000 IU/kg for one dose, i.p.), low dose vit A (5,000 IU/kg for two doses) or vehicle. Animals were followed for 48 hours and then sacrificed for histological examination. Rats with BA-induced intestinal mucosal injury had a reduction in daily weight gain (p < 0.05). Vit A supplementation significantly improved the daily weight gain in the rats with BA-induced intestinal mucosal injury and the effect is dose dependent. At sacrifice, the colon wet weight was significantly heavier and the histological injury scores from both ileum and proximal colon higher in the rats with BA-induced intestinal mucosal injury. All of those parameters were improved with vit A supplementation. We conclude that vit A supplementation ameliorates BA induced-intestinal mucosal injury in newborn rats.