The book provides science-based information about herbal remedies, other dietary supplements, and non-mainstream products promoted as cancer treatments for the medical community. Each herb or remedy description is accompanied by information as to its origin, most common uses, benefits, and risks/dangers. The book will provide detailed information on over 250 remedies and describes their constituents, mechanisms of action, adverse reactions, pharmacokinetics, and contraindications. Information on each herb or other remedy was developed through careful and critical reviews of research conducted by experts in pharmacy, botanicals, and complementary therapies. Each herb or product is described in terms of the following sections: common name, scientific name, key words, clinical summary, herbal constituents, warnings, mechanisms of action, usage, adverse reactions, drug interactions, dosage, literature summary and critique, and notes. This book has the look and feel of a fine field guide to medicinal plants, thanks to the beautiful drawings by Angela Donato, and it will be of interest to a wide audience beyond the medical specialists, including cancer patients.

Presenting detailed, evidence-based coverage of the most commonly encountered therapeutic agents in modern clinical practice, this resource is designed to help you safely and effectively integrate herbal, nutrient, and drug therapy for your patients or clients. Combining pharmaceuticals with herbs or supplements may complement or interfere with a drug's therapeutic action or may increase adverse effects. Additionally, drug-induced depletion of nutrients can occur. Comprehensive clinical data, quick-reference features, and the insight and expertise of trusted authorities help you gain a confident understanding of how herbal remedies and nutritional supplements interact with pharmaceuticals and develop safe, individualized treatment strategies for your patients. More than 60 comprehensive monographs of herb-drug and nutrient-drug interactions cover the most commonly used herbs and nutrients in health-related practice and help you coordinate safe, reliable therapy. Each herb and nutrient monograph features summary tables and concise, practical suggestions that provide quick and easy reference and complement the systematic review and in-depth analysis. References included on the bound-in CD provide high-quality, evidence-based support. Unique icons throughout the text differentiate interactions, evidence, and clinical significance. Up-to-date information keeps you current with the latest developments in pharmacology, nutrition, phytotherapy, biochemistry, genomics, oncology, hematology, naturopathic medicine, Chinese medicine, and other fields. A diverse team of authoritative experts lends valuable, trans-disciplinary insight.

Plant extracts or their pure natural constituents have been used traditionally for thousands of years for treating diseases with considerable success in India and other Asian countries. In addition, they have also been used as complements or supplements with conventional medicine. This book discusses the latest research in the application of combination therapy, namely herbs and drugs, in the treatment of a range of communicable and non-communicable diseases to achieve a synergistic effect. This synergy may help in reducing the amount of drug, its toxicity, side effects, and development of resistance as well as improve its efficacy. The book also discusses the pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic parameters, experimental tools to determine the impact of combination, computational approaches to identify synergy, statistical analysis of data, and clinical and regulatory issues. The book is useful for researchers in the fields of pharmacology, pharmacy and medicinal chemistry and those working in pharmaceutical and nutraceutical industries. This book could open up new strategies to focus on multiple targets to combat complex diseases unlike the single targeted drugs that are being currently marketed by the pharmaceuticals industries.

HERBAL MEDICINE IN PEDIATRIC ONCOLOGYIntroduction: Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) is increasing in the pediatric population with cancer. This diagnosis leaves families devastated and they feel a tremendous responsibility to ensure the best therapies for their children. Integrative medicine approach is often chosen to childu2019s care and the use of herbal products are raising and may interfere with chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Objective: The aim of this article is to synthesize the most recent evidence on the available and prevalence of herbal products use, side effects and herbal-drug interactions in the pediatric oncology population. Material and methods: A comprehensive review of the Medline, Embase and Cochrane databases was conducted and the search was defined by the terms u201cherbalu201d, u201cprevalenceu201d, u201cherbal-drug interactionu201d and u201cpediatric oncologyu201d. Inclusion criteria were primary studies involving children younger than the age of 18 years with cancer, using herbal drugs as an integrative approach. Exclusion criteria included no pediatric oncology outcomes.Results: No data are available in Portugal for herbal products use by children. Prevalence of CAM use by children in Europe was 52%. Induction of drug-metabolizing enzymes can be one of the mechanisms behind CAMu2013anticancer drug interactions. Kava-kava, vitamin E, quercetin, ginseng, garlic, u03b2-carotene and echinacea interact with anti-cancer drugs.Conclusion: Chemotherapeutic drugs have a narrow therapeutic window which increases the risk of clinically relevant herb-drug interactions with unexpected toxicities and possible undertreatment seen in cancer children. It is important that pediatricians be aware of this fact and encourage open communication with patients and their parents. More scientific evidence on the subject are imperative to prevent therapeutic failure and toxicity.

This is a professional level major reference work containing information, in A-Z format, on herb-drug, herb-supplement, herb -food and herb-laboratory test interactions; all of which is data referenced. Commercial herbal medicinal products are increasingly consumed on a regular basis by people in the developed world. Often such products are taken concurrently with conventional medicines, frequently without the knowledge of health care professionals. As more evidence has become available, there has been an increasing awareness of the potential and actual problems of interactions, often dangerous, between conventional medicines and herbal medicines. This proposed new major reference brings together available data on approximately 200 of the most commonly used herbal medicines in highly structured, rigorously scientific monographs. Although our texts on herbal medicines and drug interactions include the major well-known interactions, this text is able to treat the subject in considerably more detail.

Western drugs and target medicines for disease treatment come with undesirable side effects that have limited their use in patients for an extended period of time. It is warranted to develop a treatment strategy with alternative medicines to reduce toxicity relating to drugs, in particular, cancer drugs. Thus, a combination therapy with herbal medicines provides a more effective treatment method for hard-to-treat diseases. The recent breakthroughs in naturally occurring small molecules from herbal medicines have provided experimental evidence and are clinically significant in treatment strategies.This unique volume presents the recent developments in the field of herbal medicines for the treatment of diseases and cancer. Recent progress on small molecules isolated from herbal medicines that exhibit therapeutic benefits in humans is highlighted. The book provides an overview of the significant discoveries and pioneering contributions of herbal medicines in combination with other drugs; the author's evaluation of the combination therapy in cancer treatment; and a recent discovery of crocodile tissue extract with pharmacological properties.

Cancer is one of the leading killers in the world and the incidence is increasing, but most cancer patients and cancer survivors suffer much from the disease and its conventional treatments’ side effects. In the past, clinical data showed that some complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) possessed anticancer abilities, but some clinicians and scientists have queried about the scientific validity of CAM due to the lack of scientific evidence. There is great demand in the knowledge gap to explore the scientific and evidence-based knowledge of CAM in the anticancer field. With this aim, a book series is needed to structurally deliver the knowledge to readers. Recently there have been encouraging results from both laboratory experiments and clinical trials demonstrating the anticancer effects of herbal medicine. There is considerable interest among oncologists and cancer researchers to find anticancer agents in herbal medicine. This volume is a specialised book presenting the up-to-date scientific evidence for anticancer herbal medicine. This unique book provides an overview of the anticancer herbal medicines and remedies, as well as a detailed evidence-based evaluation of 18 common anticancer herbal medicines covering their biological and pharmacological properties, efficacies, herb-drug interactions, adverse effects, pre-clinical studies, and clinical applications. Gathering international opinion leaders’ views, this volume will contribute great to the cancer, academic, and clinical community by providing evidence-based information on the anticancer efficacy of herbal medicine. Readership Oncologists, cancer researchers, pharmacologists, pharmaceutical specialists, Chinese medicine practitioners, medical educators, postgraduates and advanced undergraduates in biomedical disciplines, cancer caregivers, cancer patients.