Drug induced liver injury associated with Chinese herbal medicine and herbal related food supplements / 中华消化杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To investigate the drug induced liver injure(DILI)associated with Chinese herbal medicine and herbal related food supplements.Methods From 1982 to 2005.8.9 consecutive pa- tients were diagnosed as DILI based on their medication history,clinical manifestation,liver function and other laboratory tests.The final retrospection confirmatory diagnosis was made according to the interna- tional scoring system for DILI.Results The 82 DILI patients(28 men,54 females,age ranging from 16 to 81 years old)accounted for 2.2% of hospitalized patients with liver dysfunction.Among those patients with DILI,30.5% was caused by weight reducing drugs or food supplements,12.2% by drugs of derma tology,8.5% by drugs for cardiovascular disease,8.5% by drugs of rheumatology,7.3% by drugs of gynecology,6.1% by drugs for liver disease,6.1% by blood-lipids modulators,3.7% by drugs for thy- roid disease,3.7% by drugs for hyperplasia of mammary glands and 13.4 % by the others.The duration of medication was from 6 clays to 6 months and the incubation period was from 6 days to 3 months.DILI could be classified as acute hepatocellular injury(36.59%),acute cholestasis(39.02%)and mixtures (24.39%).About 10% patients were accompanied by allergic manifestations.All patients recovered rap- idly after stopping the relevant medicine.Conclusion Chinese herbal medicine and herbal related food supplements are a common cause of DILI in China.The awareness and monitoring improving DILI during herbs treatment is a critical issue in daily practice.