Current Drug Metabolism - Volume 12, Issue 9, 2011

With the ever-increasing acceptance of combination therapy and the prevalence of chronic diseases in the world, the development of multi-component drug therapies including the use of herbs has become an emerging trend. Herbal medicines (HMs), generally prepared with a specific combination of different herbs, are becoming increasingly popular as a multi-component drug therapy. In addition, drug combination, as Read More

Herbal medicines (HMs) are gaining more and more attention all over the world, because of their significant curative effect in treating multi-factorial diseases. Recently, the in vivo and in vitro metabolism study of HMs has become an important issue because these data can help us to better understand the efficacies and toxicities of HMs. However, the integral metabolism profile of HMs is confronted with many challen Read More

Ginseng is an herbal medicine used worldwide. It is reported to have a wide range of pharmacological activities because of a diversified group of steroidal saponins called ginsenosides. Compared to extensive pharmacological studies of ginseng, the pharmacokinetics, especially the metabolism of this herb, has received less attention. In this article we review the known pharmacokinetic data on ginseng. Understandin Read More

In the recent decades, the use of herbal products has been rapidly growing in the Western countries. While their use in many cases causes adverse effects, to date, safety issues of herbal products have not been adequately addressed. It is rarely determined whether the non-purported bioactive constituents in the herbs and the metabolites of the bioactive components can lead to adverse effects. In this review, we discuss, using Read More

Herbal medicines and their active ingredients are widely used worldwide, and they have become an important part of clinical medicine. The combined use of herbs and drugs has increased the possibility of pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic interactions. Clinical studies have demonstrated that the combined use of herbs and drugs can enhance or attenuate the drug efficacy and toxicity. The herb-drug combin Read More

Translational research is an emerging discipline that aims to fill the gap through the whole pipeline from bench to bedside. This review highlights the importance and urgency of incorporating translational research into the study of pharmacokinetic herb drug interactions (PHDI), based on an intensive discussion on the controversial and inconsistent reports from preclinical to clinical, in vitro to in vivo, and across different studi Read More

As the prevalence of polypharmacy increases with our aging population, the propensity for adverse drug-drug interactions arising from the altered metabolism of co-administered medicines remains an important consideration for drug development. Mechanismbased inactivation (MBI) of the cytochrome P450 enzyme system is responsible for many clinically relevant drug-drug interactions (DDIs) due to the irreversible and lon Read More

Nitric oxide, a unique signalling molecule, is synthesized from L-arginine by a family of isoenzymes called nitric oxide synthase. Function of nitric oxide largely depends on the concentrations of surrounding free radicals and redox state. The local concentration of the nitric oxide defines its anti- or protumorigenic function by interacting with DNA or DNA repair enzymes and tumor suppressor gene, p53, as well. Indoleamine 2,3-di Read More

The phase II metabolism sulfation and glucuronidation, mediated by sulfotransferases (SULTs) and UDP-glucuronosyltransferases (UGTs) respectively, are significant metabolic pathways for numerous endo-and xenobiotics. Understanding of SULT/UGT substrate specificity including regioselectivity (i.e., position preference) is of great importance in predicting contribution of sulfation/ glucuronidation to drug and meta Read More