Prospects and Herb-Drug Interactions involving Herbal Antimalarials

Malaria is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in many developing tropical countries. With growing concerns about the development of resistance to current synthetic antimalarial drugs, herbal alternatives may provide significant treatment options in affected regions. This book provides an updated overview of available data on Herbal Medicinal Products (HMPs) with reproducible evidence-based antimalarial efficacy. In addition, it discusses the the putative active phytoconstituents, the challenges of product standardization and the potential of these products to modulate activities of drug metabolizing enzymes and drug transport systems. Enormous work has been reported on investigations of the antiplasmodial activity of herbs, and more than 1000 plants have been studied using in vitro and animal malaria infection models. However, only a few of these HMPs have been subjected to randomized clinical trials. Herb-drug interactions are of great concern since phytochemical compounds in HMPs are also subject to pharmacokinetic and transport processes. Thus, specific effects of these antimalarial HMPs on drug metabolizing enzymes were reported along with beneficial and safety aspects