Negligible Pharmacokinetic Interaction of Red Ginseng and Losartan, an Antihypertensive Agent, in Sprague-Dawley Rats

Abstract

Red ginseng (RG) is one of the top selling herbal medicines in Korea, but is not recommended in hypertensive patients. In this study, the pharmacokinetic (PK) interaction between RG and losartan, an antihypertensive drug, was examined. RG was orally administered for 2 wk to male Sprague-Dawley (S-D) rats at either control (0), 0.5, 1, or 2 g/kg/d for 2 wk. After the last administration of RG and 30 min later, all animals were treated with 10 mg/kg losartan by oral route. In addition, some S-D rats were administered RG orally for 21 d at 2 g/kg followed by losartan intravenously (iv) at 10 mg/kg/d. Post losartan administration, plasma samples were collected at 5, 15, and 30 min and 1, 1.5, 2, 3, 6, 12, and 24 h. Plasma concentrations of losartan and E-3174, the active metabolite of losartan, were analyzed by a high-pressure liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometer system (LC-MS/MS). Oral losartan administration showed dose-dependent pharmacokinetics (PK) increase with time to maximum plasma, but this was not significant between different groups. There was no significant change in tmax with E-3174 PK. With iv losartan, pharmacokinetics showed elevation of area under the plasma concentration-time curve from time zero extrapolated to infinitity. There was not a significant change in AUCinf with E-3174 PK. Therefore, RG appeared to interfere with biotransformation of losartan, as RG exerted no marked effect on E-3174 PK in S-D rats. Data demonstrated that oral or iv treatment with losartan in rats pretreated with RG for 2 wk showed that losartan PK was affected but E-3174 PK remained unchanged among different dose groups. These results suggested that RG induces negligible influence on losartan and E-3174 PK in rats.

Cardiovascular Effects of Herbal Products and Their Interaction with Antihypertensive Drugs—Comprehensive Review

“…Only amlodipine exhibited a delayed Tmax following multiple red ginseng extract administrations, and this was attributed to altered absorption kinetics due to decreased intestinal permeability [ 75 ]. Several animal studies indicated that red ginseng has minimal impact on the pharmacokinetics of amlodipine, as well as on that of losartan and its active metabolite EXP-3174, in rats [ 76 , 77 ].…”

Evaluation of lignan (–)-cubebin extracted fromPiper cubebaon human colon adenocarcinoma cells (HT29)

“…The use of natural products with therapeutic properties is as old as human civilization, and for a long time, minerals, plants, and animal products were the main sources of drug production (Rates, 2001;Santos et al, 2014;Maistro et al, 2015). Despite recent strides in modern medicine, plants still provide an important contribution to health (Calixto, 2000;Ryu et al, 2014). However, even though natural products are used extensively by the general population, many medicinal plants have not been subjected to rigorous scientific testing, and their properties are extremely variable (Capasso et al, 2000).…”