Effects of Feeding Chinese Herbal Medicine Additives to Newly Weaned Piglets on Mucosal Immune Function of the Small Intestine

This study investigated the influence of the inclusion of Chinese Herbal Medicine additive(CHMD) in diets for weaned piglets on parameters of mucosal immune fuction of the small intestine in a 3 weeks trial, focused on immune cell subsets and mucosal concentrations of TNF-alpha, IL-2 and IL-4. Total of 144 crossbred (Duroc x Landrace x Yorkshire) weaning piglets at 21 days of age were selected and divided randomly into 4 groups with 3 replicates of 12 piglets each. A corn soybean meal expanded soybean basal diet without antibiotics or probiotics was used as control and the other 3 groups were fed the control diet supplemented with the CHMD at rations of 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5% (wt/wt). The data showed that compared to the control group, dietary supplementation with CHMD at the 1% dose: reduced the counts of IEL/100 enterocytes in the duodenum, jejunum and ileum (p<0.05); increased the number of goblet cells in the duodenum (p<0.01) in the jejunum and ileum (p<0.05); decreased the number of mast cells in the mucosa and submucosa in the duodenum, jejunum and ileum (p<0.05), respectively had higher number of cells per villus positive for sIgA in the duodenum, jejunum (p<0.01) and in the ileum (p<0.05); decreased mucosal concentrations of TNF-alpha in the duodenum, jejunum (p<0.01) in the ileum (p<0.05), increased mucosal concentrations of IL-2 in the duodenum and jejunum (p<0.05), increased mucosal concentrations of IL-4 in the duodenum, jejunum (p<0.01). All these results suggested that the use of CHMD as an additive to positively affect on the parameters of gastrointestinal health and mucosal immune funcion of the small intestine in weanling pigs would be a valid alternative to antibiotic growth promoters of defending weaned pigs from infections and weanling stress, additionaly imply that the dose of 1% CHMD supplement is the most ideal concentration to achieve the most beneficial effects.