May 26 2009
Book Review - The Essential Herb-Drug-Vitamin Interaction Guide
The Essential Herb-Drug-Vitamin Interaction Guide by George T. Grossman, MD., and Barry Fox, Ph.D. is truly an essential addition to the bookshelf of anyone who uses herbs or vitamins on a regular basis. Although vitamins are necessary to health, and herbs are used in cooking, at theraputic levels they can interact with prescription and over-the-counter medications (and each other.) Some of these interactions can be life threatening, and an example of this is provided in the first chapter of the book; along with a handy chart of herbs, vitamins and minerals that can interact with foods, drugs, other vitamins/supplements, lab tests, or diseases.
The second chapter consists of an alphabetical listing of the various herbs, drugs, and vitamins covered. Each listing includes a short description, followed by the scientific name, the common names, which part or parts are used, what its used for, the typical dose, possible side effects, a list of drugs that may interact with it, lab tests that may be altered by its use, diseases that may be triggered or worsened by it, foods that may interact with it, and supplements that may interact with it.
The third chapter contains listings of medications that interact with herbs (listed by generic name) and the herbs and vitamins they interact with. This section is much less informative than the previous section, simply providing the herb/vitamin so that you can look it up in the previous section and see what the specific interaction is.
The remainder of the book consists of three appendices. Appendix A lists the 10 most popular herbs, Appendix B provides the properties of various herbs, and Appendix C is a listing of medications by brand name. These are small, but quite useful, sections.
Appendix B allows you to look up herbs by their action, such as checking to see which herbs lower your blood sugar. It is a very useful section; however, I found an error and a couple of omissions here. The listing for herbs and supplements with hypotensive properties is labeled as blood sugar lowering in parenthesis, when hypotensive actually means blood pressure lowering, which could cause a dangerous situation. The omissions are the sections for herbs that raise blood sugar and blood pressure. This omission is not a danger, since that information is included in Chapter 2, it does, however, make it more difficult for the user to find out which herbs have those properties.
Appendix C allows you to look up your medication by brand name, and gives the generic. This is very handy, since in Chapter 2, all medications are given by generic name to reduce the length of the listings. (Many generics are sold under multiple brand names.)
In all, this is an excellent reference, and an absolute necessity for anyone who wishes to use herbs and vitamins in combination with medications. The only modification I would like to see is the addition of a comprehensive index to allow quick reference to every page where an herb, drug, or supplement is mentioned; but even without an index, this book is very convenient to use, and finding the information is quite simple.
