Acute Liver Injury from Complementary and Alternative Medications

Although complementary and alternative medications are established as a common cause of drug-induced liver injury (DILI) — second only to prescription medications — outcomes in this setting are not well studied.

Using data from an ongoing cohort study of patients with acute liver failure, researchers compared outcomes among patients with DILI caused by complementary and alternative medications versus prescription medications. Outcomes at 21 days of enrollment were defined as transplant-free survival, liver transplantation, or death.

Of 253 patients with DILI enrolled between 1998 and 2015, complementary and alternative medicine use was identified as the cause in 41 (16%) and was increasingly identified as the cause of DILI between the first a…