The ethnopharmacology and toxicology of Urginea sanguinea in the Pretoria area.

A water extract of the bulb of the plant Urginea sanguinea Schinz = (Urginea burkei Bak) (Liliaceae) is used by the black people mainly as a 'blood purifier'. Patients admitted at the Ga-Rankuwa Hospital with Urginea sanguinea poisoning had clinical symptoms effecting any of the following systems: GIT, urinary, CNS or the splanchnic.

Application of diode array detection for the identification of poisoning by traditional medicines.

A large percentage of acute poisonings in black South Africans is due to traditional medicines and plants. The combination of isocratic high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with on line UV spectrum detection via a diode array configuration has been applied to the detection and identification of traditional medicines (and plants) in poisoned patients. Four standard isocratic systems are used.

Compliance in black patients with non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus receiving oral hypoglycaemic therapy.

Poor compliance with drug therapy is an important cause of therapeutic failure. Sixty-eight black patients with non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus receiving oral hypoglycaemic agents were interviewed and various factors, such as age, sex, degree of control and type of therapy, were recorded by means of a questionnaire. Compliance was determined by qualitatively assessing urine for the presence of the drugs.

The effect of miglitol and acarbose after an oral glucose load: a novel hypoglycaemic mechanism?

1. Alpha-glucosidase inhibitors such as miglitol and acarbose lower blood glucose after a starch load in healthy volunteers and diabetic patients by interfering with the conversion of disaccharide to monosaccharide in the gastrointestinal tract. 2.