ANALYSIS OF ANTIBACTERIAL ACTIVITY OF SPECIES USED POPULARLY IN URINARY TRACT INFECTIONS

Abstract

The Medicinal plants are increasingly being used by the population, with different purposes, such as prevention and treatment of some diseases, and also as an alternative to avoid bacterial resistance.There are reports of the popular use of some species of medicinal plants such as Matricaria recutita, Calendula officinalis L, Bauhinia forficata Link and Equisetum arvense L, for treatment and prophylaxis of urinary tract infections.This work aimed to verify, the antibacterial action of different medicinal species (M. recutita, C. officinalis L, B. forficata Link e E. arvense L) against Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Enterococcus spp. and Enterobacter spp, that cause urinary tract infection, using the disk diffusion method.The tested bacteria did not show sensitivity to the tested extracts in the concentrations of 100, 500and 1000 mg/mL, even having reports of popular use for this purpose.This result may be associated to use of species B. forficata and E. arvense not because act as antibacterials, but because they stimulate diuresis.In the case of species M. recutita and C. officinalis it is possible that it is used in the ITU due to the anti-inflammatory effect and not to the antibacterial effect as expected, indicating the use of the sespecies as a prophylactic in the ITU, furthermore it is possible that climatic factors during the development of the plant,have reduced the amount of secondary metabolites like for example, flavonoids,interfering in the possible antibacterial activity.Thus, new studies are suggested using different extractive methodologies.