Abstract:

Staphylococcus aureus and Candida species continues to be one of the commonest pathogens encountered in clinical as well as laboratory practice. It is has become a major health problem worldwide. Newer antimicrobial agents of plant source are urgently needed to combat this problem due to their fewer side effects. Nigella sativa oil commonly known as black seed oils was aimed at evaluating if it had any antimicrobial effect to Staphylococcus aureus and Candida species isolates.

Methodology: Antibacterial and antifungal of Nigella sativa oil was studied to 10 isolates of Staphylococcus aureus and 10 isolates of Candida species. Disk agar diffusion technique was used using impregnated filter paper disk on inoculated Mueller Hinton Agar plates and Sabouraud Dextrose Agar plates respectively. Staphylococcus aureus ATCC was used as the standard reference strain.

Results: All bacterial isolates tested (100%) were susceptible to Nigella sativa oil the used standard drugs for Staphylococcus aureus showed highly susceptibility patterns except Cefoxitin (0%) About 40 40%) of candida species isolates were sensitive to Intraconazole, 30% were sensitive to Voriconazole; but all of them (100%) were resistant to Nigella sativa oil.

Conclusion: Nigella sativa oil a promising anti-Staphylococcal plant extract given the high susceptibility pattern shown in Staphylococcus aureus clinical isolates but it lacked antifungal activity to Candida species may be due to crude methods of extraction employed in this study. Further research using extraction methods is recommended so as to reliably ascertain the efficacy of Nigella sativa as reported in other countries.