EFFECT OF DIETARY LACTO ACIDOPHILUS® SUPPLEMENTATION ON LIVER FUNCTION OF BROILER CHICKENS

Abstract

Effect of lacto acidophilus dietary supplementation on liver function of broilers chickens was studied. Two hundred and fifty-five one-day-old mixed sex Abor acre broiler chicks were allocated to five dietary treatments with three replicates consisting of 17 birds per replicate. Treatment 1 was the basal diet (positive control) with neither probiotic nor antibiotic addition.Treatment 2, 3 and 4 comprised of basal diet with 150, 200 and 250g/100kg Lacto Acidophilus®
respectively while treatment 5 contained basal diet with 66g oxytetracycline (negative control).Total protein (TP), albumin, globulin, aspartateamino transferase (AST) and alanine-amino transferase (ALT)) were significantly different (P<0.05) across all the treatments with the exception of alkaline phosphate (ALP). However, it was observed that chickens fed 250g/100kg diet had the highest values for the all the parameters measured, although some values were similar to the values recorded for the control. The linear trends, either positive or negative, observed in many of the parameters studied of chickens fed 250g lacto acidophilus/100kg of diet; suggest that more studies are needed to establish the optimal concentration of probiotics in broiler feed. Also the  echanism by which probiotics affect liver function remains unclear, this calls for further investigations.