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The cholesterol-lowering herbal supplement guggulsterone accelerates the breakdown of prescription drugs that fight the effects of AIDS and cancer, according to a study reported in the August issue of the Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics.
Guggulsterone is extracted from the resinous sap of the Guggul tree grown in India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. This resin has been used for centuries as part of India's traditional medicine. The refined version of Guggulsterone is known as Gugulipid, which is sold in health food stores and online as a non-prescription cholesterol-lowering agent.
Researchers at the University of Kansas found that the active ingredient in the herbal supplement gugulipid turns on a cell receptor called PXR that, in turn, triggers a liver enzyme that breaks down and diminishes the effects of the AIDS drug AZT, anticancer agents and cholesterol-lowering statins.
Lead researcher Jeff Staudinger, University of Kansas assistant professor of pharmacology and toxicology, said that once triggered this liver enzyme can also turn some chemicals that do not cause cancer into carcinogens.
"This country's diet is atrocious, so there are plenty of people walking around with high cholesterol," Staudinger said. "They'll get on the Web and see that gugulipid herbal therapy lowers cholesterol and is available without a prescription. They may then begin self-medicating with gugulipid in addition to other drugs prescribed by their physician. In this study, we've shown that, when they do, they have a high likelihood of causing herb-drug interactions."
Staudinger and his colleagues made their findings in experiments with gugulipid that they purchased from a health-food store in Lawrence, Kans. and with guggulsterone in its pure form.
Source: Medical Week staff, week of September 25, 2004
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