Effects of Selected Natural Health Products on Drug Metabolism: Implications for Pharmacovigilance

• Main Author: Liu, Rui
• Language: en
• Published: 2011
• Subjects: Cree Traditional Medicine; Cytochrome P450; Enzyme Inhibition; FMO; Human Carboxylesterase 1; Mechanism Based Inactivation; Metabolic drug interaction; Natural Health Products; Oseltamivir; Traditional Chinese Medicine; Type 2 Diabetes
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10393/19818

Seventeen Cree anti-diabetic herbal medicines and eight Traditional Chinese Medicines have been examined for their potential to cause interactions with drugs, which is considered as a major reason for adverse drug effects. Specifically, the effect of these natural health products was examined on major Phase I drug metabolism enzymes including cytochrome P450, human carboxylesterase-1 and flavin-containing monooxygenases. Several of these natural health products have the potential to cause adverse drug effect through the inhibition of major drug metabolism enzymes. The results indicated that 7 Cree medicines plant extracts inhibited CYP3A4 activity, and 3 of them have been proven to cause potent mechanism-based inactivation of CYP3A4. Seven of eight Traditional Chinese Medicines have been identified as strong CYP3A4 inhibitors; the ethanol extract of Goji has identified as a potent inhibitor for CYP2C9 and 2C19. Goji juice showed universal inhibitory effects on most of the tested enzymes except flavin-containing monooxygenases 3.