用於中草藥及膳食補充品的人參毒性研究   全文下載

Toxicity of Panax Genseng – An Herbal Medicine and Dietary Supplement

人參膳食補充品在美國的各類草藥膳食補充品中，銷售量列居前茅。標準品牌的Ginsana（G115 ginseng）是中國參或韓國參（Panax ginseng），占有半數的美國市場。有消費者向美國食品暨藥物管理局投訴服用人參膳食補充品的副作用。人參濫用綜合病徵（ginseng abuse syndrome）亦常有報導。久服人參的副作用不明。有鑑於此，美國國家衛生部（national institute of health）己向美國國家毒理部（national Toxicology Program）提名，做人參膳食補充品的動物致癌實驗。本文對人參的生長、藥性、生物效應及毒性略做介紹。美國國家毒理部的長期動物致癌實驗所得結果，是美國政府機關用做制定法規的依據。為此，本文將其執行人參長期動物致癌實驗的研究計劃詳細描述。

Ginseng is one of the most popular herbal dietary supplements in the U.S. market, with five to six million persons using it even before the recent boom in the herbal supplement industry. Ginsana (G115 ginseng), a standardized extract of Panax ginseng (Asian ginseng, also called Chinese or Korean ginseng) controls half of this market. Numerous reports of adverse effects from products containing ginseng have been filed with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The literature also documents “ginseng abuse syndrome” among regular users. The chronic effects of ginseng are not well characterized. Because of its significant human exposure and little information on toxicity is available, Panax ginseng has been nominated by the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) to the U.S. National Toxicology Program (NTP) for assessing its carcinogenic potential. In this review, we discuss the environmental occurrence, purported therapeutic effects, biological effects, and toxicity of ginseng, with focus on Panax ginseng. To demonstrate how NTP chronic tumorigenicity bioassays are conducted, the tumorigenicity bioassay of Panax ginseng is detailed described.