ABSTRACT
Objective: Utilization of herbal remedies rich in flavonoids and vitamins have increased significantly these days to treat various disorders, thus existing research work encircled to appraise the analgesic effect of Nelumbo nucifera fruit (NNF) for evaluating its traditional use pharmacologically in disorders which are associated with pain and inflammation. Methods: Central analgesic activity in mice was assessed by tail flick test and the latency time i.e. the removal of tail from the stimulus was recorded. Similarly acetic acid induced writhing test was also conducted for the assessment of peripheral analgesic effect in mice and number of writhes was counted along with percent inhibition of writhes. Results: In tail flick test the peek anti-nociceptive effect at all doses of fruit was observed at 90 min. However, the percentage of tail elongation time was highest at a dose of 200 mg/kg i.e. 82% at 90 min. Number of writhes was highly significantly reduced at all doses of NNF but maximum effects were observed at dose 200 mg/kg as compared to control, indicating 48.41 % inhibition of writhes. Conclusion: NNF have exhibited strong analgesic effect in both animal models, which may be connected with the synergistic actions of flavonoids, saponins and tannins on arachidonic acid pathway inhibition. Hence NNF seems to have a great potential in disorders associated with pain but more experimental trials in this field are required to confirm these findings.