[Morphological changes in the digestive organs on the administration of the antineoplastic antibiotics, rubomycin and...

The effect of antitumour antibiotics, such as rubomycin and karminomycin on the digestive tract as one of the most vulnerable systems during chemotherapy was studied. Investigation of the tongue, oesophagus, stomach, small and large intestine of mice with the current morphological and some histochemical methods showed that the most pronounced changes in the above organs occurred during the first 10 days after the drug administration. The damages were of the same type, i.e. dystrophic changes in the tegmental and granular epithelium with edema and infiltration of the mucosa and tunica submucosa. The drugs induced a decrease in the levels of the nucleic acids, protein and hydrolytic enzymes and impairement of the distribution pattern of these substances in the cells. Karminomycin had a more pronounced effect and its damaging effect was more stable as compared to rubomycin.