As an epileptic, can I take St John's wort? (From Lancashire Telegraph)

As an epileptic, can I take St John's wort?

11:02am Friday 13th February 2009 in

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I have epilepsy, which has been well controlled for many years. Recently I’ve also been depressed, and I don’t want to take a prescription medicine for it because it might interfere with the effectiveness of my anti-convulsants. A friend recommended St John’s wort to me as a more natural remedy for depression. Can I take that?

Absolutely not. St John’s wort will interact with any anti-epilepsy medicine, making it less effective. It may even bring your seizures back. It is far safer to take a prescription anti-depressant that has been shown not to interact with your drugs. Just because a medicine is ‘natural’ doesn’t mean that it is safe. To work in depression even a ‘natural’ medicine has to act on the same chemical systems in your brain that have caused your depression in the first place. It is crucial to choose a drug that doesn’t also act on the systems that deal with your anticonvulsant medicine, too. The active chemical in St John’s wort does precisely that.