The Expanding Complexity of Medicine–Herb–Food Combinations
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.64137/31079911/IJMST-V1I2P102Keywords:
Medicine–Herb–Food Interactions, Herb–Drug Interactions, Nutraceuticals, Pharmacokinetics, Food–Drug Interactions, Phytochemicals, Safety Assessment, Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM), Adverse Effects, PolypharmacyAbstract
Modern pharmacology usually tests one drug at a time. However, in the real world, patients take pharmaceuticals alongside herbal supplements and bioactive food components.This article looks at the massive complexity of these combinations and what they mean for patient safety. Using data from DrugBank and botanical databases, we estimate that humans regularly encounter about 33,987 bioactive substances. This leads to more than 570 million potential pairwise interactions a scale that makes it impossible for doctors to memorize or for labs to test. Adverse drug reactions should be seen as a result of a complex system rather than just a "bad drug." We argue for a shift toward systems pharmacology and the use of computer tools to manage the unpredictability of modern medicine.
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