Coming Soon to a Grocery Near You?
Another piece of news from the world of medical research; one that will make some readers very happy. Scientists have discovered that a group of plant components called furanocoumarins cause the interaction between some medications and grapefruit juice.
Furanocoumarins disrupt the normal medication processing system in the liver, causing there to be much more medication available in the blood stream. The result is the potential for toxic levels of the medication to build up in the blood, significantly increasing the risk of side effects.
This interaction affects those with cardiovascular disease in particular, because it is common with the cholesterol lowering statin drugs, and the calcium channel blockers, used for blood pressure control, abnormal heart rhythms, and Prinzmetal's angina.
Researchers were able to remove the furanocoumarins from grapefruit juice and these samples did not cause the interaction. You can bet that companies making grapefruit juice will be marketing furanocoumarin-free grapefruit juice as soon as it is humanly possible. Scientists are also hopeful that now that the problem chemical has been identified they can test other likely foods for it, thus allowing them to warn individuals about other possible drug-food interactions. Some days science is a wonderful thing!
Laurie
Science may set limits to knowledge, but should not set limits to imagination.
Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970)
Related Topics: Drug Interactions: What You Should Know, Have Hypertension? Watch What You're Popping For Pain
Technorati Tags: medication interaction, grapefruit juice, hypertension, statins
Furanocoumarins disrupt the normal medication processing system in the liver, causing there to be much more medication available in the blood stream. The result is the potential for toxic levels of the medication to build up in the blood, significantly increasing the risk of side effects.
This interaction affects those with cardiovascular disease in particular, because it is common with the cholesterol lowering statin drugs, and the calcium channel blockers, used for blood pressure control, abnormal heart rhythms, and Prinzmetal's angina.
Researchers were able to remove the furanocoumarins from grapefruit juice and these samples did not cause the interaction. You can bet that companies making grapefruit juice will be marketing furanocoumarin-free grapefruit juice as soon as it is humanly possible. Scientists are also hopeful that now that the problem chemical has been identified they can test other likely foods for it, thus allowing them to warn individuals about other possible drug-food interactions. Some days science is a wonderful thing!
Laurie
Science may set limits to knowledge, but should not set limits to imagination.
Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970)
Related Topics: Drug Interactions: What You Should Know, Have Hypertension? Watch What You're Popping For Pain
Technorati Tags: medication interaction, grapefruit juice, hypertension, statins
5 Comments:
That's great news! A lot of my patients really like grapefruit juice and have missed it. Cheers from The Nurse Practitioner's Place and Nurse Practitioner News
very interesting, i'm sure there will be a decent market for this kind of grapefruit, esp since lipitor and the statins are the best selling medications in the world, right?
Thanks to you both for posting comments! Nice to know someone is out there reading :>)
Since grapefruit increases the amount of medication in the blood stream, shouldn't we be able to eat the grapefruit and cut down on the amount of medication we take?
Good news about the removal of Furanocoumarins from grapefruuit. I've been on Lipitor for 7 years and really miss Grapefruit. Are there Furanocoumarins in Pomelos, Ugli Fruit or Tangelos? It seems that the Ugli and the Pomelo would make good alternatives. No one here locally has a clue on that chemical or those fruits.
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