ABSTRACT

Essentially, sleep is a behavioral state. It is estimated that an individual spends approximately one third of his lifetime in sleep. We have knowledge that sleep is part of the daily routine in everyone even when the normal sleep and wake cycle (or pattern) is disrupted by outside factors. Sleep can be defined as “an active state of unconsciousness produced by the body where the brain is in a relative state of rest and is reactive primarily to internal stimulus. It is distinguished from wakefulness by a decreased ability to react to stimuli, but more reactive than a coma or disorders of consciousness, with sleep displaying very different and active brain patterns. Quinine, as a component of the bark of the cinchona (quina-quina) tree, was used to treat malaria from as early as the 1600s, when it was referred to as the "Jesuits' bark," "cardinal's bark," or "sacred bark. Quinine remains an important anti-malarial drug almost 400 years after its effectiveness was first documented. Quinine is a cinchona alkaloid that belongs to the aryl amino alcohol group of drugs. Sodium thiopental is an ultra-short-acting barbiturate and has been used commonly in the induction phase of general anesthesia. In veterinary medicine, sodium thiopental is used to induce anesthesia in animals. This research work is carried out with the aim of evaluating and comparing the effects of varying doses of administered quinine on sodium thiopental-induced sleep pattern in wistar rats. Healthy adult rats of comparable size, weight and age were employed to examine the onset time (sleep latency) and the duration of thiopental sodium-induced sleep in pretreated doses of quinine. The time of the onset and duration of the induced sleep were computed in varying doses of quinine. The results showed that there were no statistically significant differences (P>0.05) in the onset of sleep across the groups and there were statistically significant increases (P<0.05) in the duration of sleep in all the groups,when compared to the control group. The onset time of the induced sleep were not significantly different in higher doses of quinine, while the sleep duration were prolonged in higher doses of quinine. It was concluded that quinine may possess some central nervous system properties that account for the observed potentiating influence on the induced sleep.