Do medical herbs really have side effects?
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A side effect is any result of a compound that you don't want.
So if the compound that became Viagra stayed a heart medication...the thing that makes it popular today would have been a side effect.
While the effects of most herbs are quite mild, some are very potent and must be administered with great care.
The best example is the herb Foxglove which gives us Digitalis. The right dosage can open the blood vessels and improve circulation. Too much will shut down your heart.
Now that's a side effect!
Fortunately, not all plants pack the punch of foxglove.
In spite of them having mild (or more modulated, to be accurate) effects, any herb can cause a pharmacokinetic or a pharmacodynamic interaction. Of course many foods can have the same effect as herbs are just foods anyway. This is why any patient on "more potent" pharmaceutical drugs, which all have a greater risk of toxicity, needs to be aware of their diet and should know what herbs and foods might enchance or cancel out the effects of their medication.
Up until about 20 years ago, the pharmacology curriculum required botany to show students just how the various phytochemicals in plants give rise to these potent effects and also why certain parts of plants may have a strong effect or no effect at all.
Yes they do, I do not have any pharmacy education like you, but i know from experience they do. I got interested in herbs & natural ways to treat things & read a couple year anything i could find on herbs, vitamins, minerals etc. For instance a person taking Prozac does not want to take St Johns Wart at the same time, bad interaction. Lot of things in the herbal diet pills are dangerous to someone with high blood pressure as they tend to act like "speed" increase the pulse & bp to much. Even if your BP is treated adequately, it will increase MORE on the same amount of the natural diet herbs than a person without high blood pressure. Garlic is safe, large amount of vit C can cause severe diarrhea. Valerian Root I have been told & read should not be taken with sedatives either, these are just a few examples of things I have read, experienced or learned from a pharmacist who does know quite a bit about natural medicine.
sure they do.
if an herb has the power to heal it also has the power to harm.
herbs can interact with other herbs as well as with medications.
you should get the herbal PDR & the German Kommission E monographs (that's like the German FDA) which are actually 100 times better than the herbal PDR (the Europeans are far ahead of us on herbs).
The German book has all the information on which herbs ineteract w/ other herbs & other meds.
In general the side effects from medical herbs are less severe than those from prescription medicines. A lot of herbal medication gives you no side effects at all.
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