— Christine M. Kukka, Project Manager, HBV Advocate
A woman infected with HBV died from liver failure after she took a
combination of traditional Chinese herbal medications to treat her
irritable bowel syndrome.
Australian researchers, writing in the June issue of the journal Forensic Science International,
said the 43-year-old woman took a combination of traditional Chinese
herbs, including: Astragalus propinquus, Codonopsis pilosula (dang shen
or poor man's ginseng), Paeonia (peony), Atractylodes macrocephala,
Pueraria, Poria cocos (a fungus), Dioscorea opposita (Chinese yam),
Patriniae, Psoralea corylifolia, Alpinia katsumadai (from the ginger
family), Glycyrrhiza uralensis (Chinese licorice) and Dolomiaea souliei
as treatment for her irritable bowel syndrome.
She had taken the herbal treatments for a brief period when she developed severe liver failure from "drug/chemical toxicity."
"While numerous studies have evaluated the effect
of polypharmacy (drug combinations), the study of multiple concurrent
herb use is only just emerging, despite the popularity of herbal
medicine use in the Western world," scientists wrote.
"As this case demonstrates ... fulminant hepatic
(liver) failure and death may be caused by the concomitant use of a
number of herbal products," they wrote, "the possibility of untoward
effects from herbal polypharmacy must be increasingly considered in the
evaluation of medicolegal cases."
Source: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24915453
Labels: alternative medicine, fulminant hepatitis, herbal toxicity, warnings
