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The ARCHIVES is commendable to include in the November 9, 1998, issue a series of excellent review articles on complementary and alternative medicine, including the article on herbal medicinals by Miller.¹

I would like to comment on the section on ginseng, where the identity issue is emphasized. The author quotes from an article by McRae,² stating "the eleutherosides have been associated with falsely elevated digoxin levels in the absence of digoxin toxic effects presumably because of an interaction with the digoxin assay."

Unfortunately, Dr Miller does not follow up on the subsequent Letter to the Editor by Awang,³ which pointed out serious chemical inaccuracies in the article. He remarked on eleuthero (Siberian ginseng) glycosides being in no way "related to cardiac glycosides such as digoxin," and stated that eleutherosides have not been observed to have cardiogenic effect. Dr Awang questioned the validity of the claim that the plant ingested was . . . [Full Text of this Article]

RELATED ARTICLE

Herbal Medicinals: Selected Clinical Considerations Focusing on Known or Potential Drug-Herb Interactions
Lucinda G. Miller
Arch Intern Med. 1998;158(20):2200-2211.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT