St Johns Wort

[n00b]

Dies naybody know if it is OK to take St Johns Wort while I am taking Budesonide?

My GI nurse is away on holiday and thought someone round here may know

 

[wolfem]

Hey, I really don't know. All I know is you have to be careful when taking St. John's Wort with certain drugs because certain ones can offset how it gets metabolized in the liver and cause possible toxicity.

Anyway, I'm not a doctor but I've heard to double-check when taking it in combination with other drugs. Pharmacist might know more

 

[DustyKat]

Other medications can affect the removal of budesonide from your body, which may affect how budesonide works. Examples include azole antifungals (such as ketoconazole), macrolide antibiotics (such as erythromycin), rifamycins (such as rifabutin), St. John's wort, drugs used to treat seizures (such as carbamazepine, phenytoin), among others.

Source:
http://www.webmd.com/drugs/drug-22008-budesonide+oral.aspx?drugid=22008&drugname=budesonide+oral

I would hold off on the St. John's Wort until you get confirmation that it is okay from your GI.

Dusty. xxx

 

[Beach]

Are you looking to take St. John's Wart due to depression? If so you might consider other products and ideas such as supplementing with the sunshine vitamin D3, fish oil, avoiding wheat, SAMe, etc.

 

[n00b]

Yes I seem to be suffering from low mood. Not sure why and heard St Johns might help but I am open to better suggestions

 

[Beach]

I've heard that St. Johns Wart can be a good product to take for mild depression. You might contact the company Finzelberg/ Martin Bauer about drug interaction concerns and where you can buy their product.

http://www.martin-bauer-group.com/e...l-supplementsfinzelberg/about-finzelberg.html

For other ideas, avoiding wheat/gluten sensitivity seems to be a help many looking to find relief from depression. Here is one example on that ~

"Wheat is hebetudinous"

http://www.wheatbellyblog.com/2012/03/wheat-is-hebetudinous/

snippet:

Darin posted this comment about his wheat-free experience in obtaining relief from depression:

I’d never heard of celiac disease before reading your book. I”d always sort of rolled my eyes at the black helicopter hysteria about GMO in general and wheat in particular. I”d just finished Why We Get Fat and had embarked on a LC [low-carbohydrate] way of living. Then I started reading your book. Within the first 50 pages of your book I was wheat-free. Within a few days (I think) of removing wheat from my diet I quit getting headaches and heart burn. In 5 months (approximately) I”ve dropped 65 pounds (wheat-free and LC) and I feel better than I’ve felt in many, many years.

Although I still get the occasional headache I haven”t had one iota of heartburn since dropping wheat and most gluten. The lassitude and hebetude that has plagued me for going on 20 years is gone! I was suffering from some very serious depression, which is a secret that I shared with no one and I”m willing to admit now because it has totally been erased from my life . . .

Darin’s post makes me wonder how many other people are silently experiencing depression, the sad, hopelessness that keeps you from performing optimally or just being happy, due to wheat consumption....

And for other ideas to look at, recall this article on Dr. Briffa's sight:

"Mental illness is not ‘all in the mind’"

snippet:

....In my view, one of the major deficiencies of psychiatry is how it views almost all mental illness as a problem which originates in the brain. The psychiatric model of illness is generally based on the idea that brain function goes awry when brain chemicals (neurochemicals) become imbalanced. For example, depression is seen very often as a result of not having enough serotonin. So, drugs that elevate levels of serotonin then become the mainstay treatment for this condition.

Over the years, though, I’ve seen quite a lot of people in practice who seem to have or have been formally diagnosed with some form of mental illness, who actually turn out to have their problem rooted in issues that fall, strictly speaking, outside the brain. Here are a few examples:

1. people with mood swings caused by fluctuation in blood sugar levels

2. people with depression who have low thyroid function

3. people with low mood who have iron deficiency and/or anaemia

4. people with low mood/depression who have weakened adrenal gland function

5. people who have low mood/depression as a result of food sensitivity issues (often wheat, by the way)

6. people who have the symptoms of bulimia nervosa (binging and purging) as a result of blood sugar fluctuation

7. people who have anxiety/depression as a result of a deficiency in omega-3 fats

8. people who have anxiety/insomnia as a result of low levels of magnesium

The important thing is that when the underlying nature of these issues are rectified, the mental state of individuals usually takes on a completely different complexion.

Most psychiatrists, I think it’s fair to say, will generally not entertain such thoughts. This is, to a large part I think, a product of their schooling. If every psychiatric journal and psychiatry conference bangs on about the neurochemical basis of mental illness, it’s perhaps no surprise that many psychiatrists will not have a mind to look further and deeper than this. However, not all psychiatrists are of this persuasion, it seems.

I was very interested this week to come across this article on line in the Wall Street Journal. The article is about the book Unmasking Psychological Symptoms: How Therapists Can Learn to Recognize the Psychological Presentation of Medical Disorders by US psychiatrist Barbara Schildkrout. ...

The rest of the article can be seen at:

http://www.drbriffa.com/2011/08/11/mental-illness-is-not-all-in-the-mind/

 

[Susan2]

Yes I seem to be suffering from low mood. Not sure why and heard St Johns might help but I am open to better suggestions

I know that it is difficult when you feel low, but exercise is great for lifting the spirits. It alters serotonin levels in the brain and leads to improved mood and feelings of wellbeing.

 

[JakeL]

Play sports. It has helped me so much whenever I feel down. I might even say that it has transformed my life.

 

[my_user_name]

I'm responding because I just spent 3 months taking both Entocort (budesonide) and St. John's Wort concurrently. I experienced no ill side-effects as far as I know. I think the St. John's Wort attenuated some of the mood side-effects I usually get from steroid medications. There may have been some physical effect I'm unaware of (I just finished my round of entocort last week) but nothing has shown itself yet.

I consulted my GP, my GI specialist and a psychiatrist about taking both drugs at once - they expressed misgivings but as we all know, we develop our treatment less at the direction of our doctors and more in partnership with our doctors, and I insisted that I wanted to take the risk of mixing the medications. They told me to stop if I had any significant side-effects. I'd done a lot of research on St. John's wort interactions, and could find no positive evidence of there being any bad interactions. I considered myself a test-case and I can report that in my case all went well. Your milage may vary.

 

[nogutsnoglory]

If its mild depression I'd personally try a safer route. Fish oil. St John can interact with many things. It didn't help me a few years ago but my depression was pretty severe.