The Center for Alternatives to Animal Testing is an academic center affiliated with the Division of Toxicological Sciences in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences of the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health.

 

Johns Hopkins School of Public Health

Research Grants 1983-1984

Development of an In Vitro System for Testing Irritants of Vaginal Mucous Membrane

Norman H. Dubin, PhD
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland

Problem

Numerous commerical preparations are available to women for intravaginal use. The vagina and cervix have mucous membranes which are susceptible to a variety of irritants. These include deodorants, spermicides, and local antibiotics or other drugs used to treat vaginal disease. Evaluation of commercial products of this type with an in vitro system would be desirable. While irritation and inflammation in vivo involve interaction of many systems-- such as the skin, macrophages, circulatory and nerves-- a general indicator of inflammation and cellular toxicity is the release of prostaglandins by affected tissues. The researcher proposes to do short-term culturing of tissues from the rat vagina and cervix and measure the concentration of prostanoids released into the incubation media over various times of incubation. The effects of known irritants of vaginal mucosal membranes on this system would be tested. These would include alcohol, acetone and podophyllin, a drug used to treat vaginal warts. It is anticipated that these drugs would cause an increase in prostaglandin release. Vagina and cervices used in these experiments would be from rats in different stages of cycle and pregnancy to compare relative sensitivity of these organs to drugs at different reproductive states.

Impact of the Research

It is anticipated that the in vitro system described above will be helpful in safety screening of new drugs. The test system as described would obviate the need for live animal testing and, if successful, the experiments might be extended to appropriate cell lines which would ultimately result in a reduction in numbers of animals used.