Interactions Between Drugs and Herbs

Although there's a sizeable number of the population that takes prescription drugs and herbal medications at the same time, the amount of reported herb-drug interactions is minuscule. Many of those reactions reported are based on extremely high doses of the phytochemicals (chemicals derived from plants), demonstrated in laboratory tests. Actual incidents are usually relegated to "accidental" status by the very people who suffer them.

There are many reasons for interactions to occur, primary among them good manufacturing procedure. Unfortunately, the government doesn't oversee the manufacture of products labeled nutritional supplements with the same intensity as prescriptive drugs; therefore quality control (when it does exist) is lax at best.

Nutritional products can run from NO active ingredients to 150% of labeled strength. When taking products like these in conjunction with prescription drugs, one can expect some kind of interaction to occur.

Another possible cause of interaction is the quality of the raw material. A diversity of species, impurities, pollutants and other factors may combine to create problems for the end user. Coupled with poor manufacturing techniques and lack of quality control, these might easily lead to interactions with prescriptive drugs.

If a patient is taking an herbal supplement and prescription medication(s) and meets one or more of certain conditions (long term therapy, high dosages, multiple products), he/she should consult with a physician prior to the start of therapy, or at the first sign of unexpected or unwanted effects. Some effects may be dose related (taken in very large doses or over a long term), and some may be immediate, caused by definitive interactions between the drugs.

Regardless of the cause, drug-herb interactions are a growing concern for health care practitioners. With all the talk of releasing more potent and specific prescriptive drugs to the open market, and the populace's growing use of "nutritional" products, herb-drug interactions are bound to increase, likely becoming more severe as well.

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