Article Summary Quick Read

If you take drugs and supplements you should be aware that there could be some interactions which could either reduce or boost prescription medication effectiveness. Enter the ones you’re taking into the fields in this interactions checker to find out all about possible negative and positive interactions.

Do you swallow both prescription medication and supplements?

If you take prescription medication and supplements – and according to surveys, nearly 25% of U.S. adults do – you need to have access to this interactions checker.  Concurrently taking a prescription medication with a dietary supplement may be harmful to your health according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. There are common herbal dietary supplement–drug interactions to be aware of. Drug interactions with Goldenseal and St. John’s wort are some that are highly likely, and you should avoid concurrent use with over-the-counter or prescription medications. Some supplements may cause interactions with a few medications but are likely to be safe with other medications (e.g., curcumin, echinacea, garlic, Asian ginseng, green tea extract, kava kava). Some supplements have a low likelihood of drug interactions and, with certain caveats, can safely be taken with most medications (e.g., black cohosh, cranberry, ginkgo, milk thistle, American ginseng, saw palmetto, valerian).

Some supplements can offset the side effects of drugs

Where many experts only focus on the negative interactions between drug-supplements, there are also many positive interactions to learn about. For example, if you take a cholesterol lowering medication, you also need to supplement with CoQ10 as these medications cause a depletion of it in the body. I recommend you find it in the “Ubiquinol” form as this is much better absorbed by the body. Another example would be if you are taking an antibiotic like Azithromycin (aka Zithromax or Z-PACK), you would benefit from taking a high dose probiotic, some vitamin C, and a B-complex.

In my free interactions checker, you can add a list of all of your medications and supplements to see how – if at all – they negatively and positively interact with each other.