Justicia adhatoda · PhytoNexus

01 Identity and provenance

Accepted binomial: Justicia adhatoda
Common names: Vasaka
Family (APG IV): Acanthaceae
Part used: Leaf
Verification tier: Tier 2 · Verified Clinical columns reviewed and a source is on record.
Reviewer note (2026 audit): Reference not supplied - claim unverified against primary literature.

02 Constituent chemistry

Chemical class	Marker compound	Synthetic analogue in use
Quinazoline alkaloids	Vasicinone Leaf	Bromhexine

The analogue column is what makes the interaction reasoning tractable: where a constituent has a marketed structural counterpart, the counterpart's interaction profile is the starting hypothesis for the plant.

Looking up structures and physicochemical properties from PubChem…

03 Stated application

Reported activity: Expectorant
Marketed in: Himalaya Koflet Syrup
Reported adverse effects: Stomach irritation

04 Interaction matrix

Source column, verbatim: Antitussive drugs
Normalised onto 1 canonical drug class below.

Curated from the reviewed source

Drug class	Severity	Mechanism type	Provenance	Expected effect
Antitussives and expectorants Respiratory	1Minor	PD-antagonistic	curated B	Sputum retention, ineffective cough clearance, additive drowsiness.	why ▾
Class mechanism. Expectorant botanicals promote productive cough while centrally acting antitussives suppress it, so the two purposes conflict; sedating antitussives also add to botanical CNS depression. Expected Sputum retention, ineffective cough clearance, additive drowsiness. Management Choose one strategy. Avoid combining a suppressant with a mucolytic botanical in productive cough. Onset rapid Evidence B - reviewed clinical column, source pending Matched on “antitussive drugs” Find evidence for this pair Map this mechanism

Predicted from constituent chemistry

These edges are not clinical findings. Each one is a rule inference: a constituent class in this plant is known to act on a target that the drug class also acts on. They are shown because a blank cell reads as “safe”, and for a Tier 1 entry a blank cell only means “not yet looked at”. Treat them as a literature-search agenda, not as a warning.

Drug class	Severity	Mechanism type	Provenance	Expected effect
Narrow-therapeutic-index CYP3A4 substrates Pharmacokinetic	4Contraindicated	PK-CYP3A4	predicted D	Toxic accumulation or subtherapeutic failure of the co-prescribed drug, s…	why ▾
Chemistry of this pair. Alkaloidal bases have pH-dependent absorption and commonly interact with hepatic CYP isoenzymes and efflux transporters. Class mechanism. Furanocoumarins, bergamottin, piperine, glabridin and berberine inhibit CYP3A4; hyperforin, andrographolide and several diterpenes induce it through PXR. Because CYP3A4 handles roughly half of marketed drugs, the affected list is broad and the direction is product-specific. Expected Toxic accumulation or subtherapeutic failure of the co-prescribed drug, sometimes fatal for antiarrhythmics, immunosuppressants and oncology agents. Management Screen the full regimen for 3A4 substrates. Where the substrate has a narrow index, avoid rather than monitor. Onset unspecified Evidence D - in silico rule prediction only Find evidence for this pair Map this mechanism
Antacids, PPIs and H2 blockers Gastrointestinal	2Moderate	PK-absorption	predicted D	Reduced or erratic absorption of alkaloids; heartburn and reflux from pre…	why ▾
Chemistry of this pair. Alkaloidal bases have pH-dependent absorption and commonly interact with hepatic CYP isoenzymes and efflux transporters. Class mechanism. Gastric pH elevation alters the dissolution and ionisation of alkaloidal and enteric-coated botanical products; menthol- and peppermint-oil products lose their enteric protection at high pH and can be released prematurely. Expected Reduced or erratic absorption of alkaloids; heartburn and reflux from premature release of volatile-oil preparations. Management Separate administration by 2 hours. Avoid non-enteric peppermint oil in reflux disease. Onset unspecified Evidence D - in silico rule prediction only Find evidence for this pair Map this mechanism

05 Hazard register

The audit recorded no hazard beyond the interaction profile. The controlled-vocabulary field reads not assessed, which means the assessment has not been done rather than that it came back clear.

06 Confusable material

No same-genus or shared-common-name entry in the corpus.

07 Mechanism map

Chemistry sorts to the left, pharmacology to the right. Dashed edges are predicted. Drag nodes, scroll to zoom, export at 3× for a figure.

species

chemical class

marker compound

drug class

expected effect

hazard

08 Open literature

Abstract-scoped query built from this binomial, its common names and its marker compounds, run live against Europe PMC, PubMed and OpenAlex, then ranked locally against an evidence hierarchy.

Checking openFDA spontaneous reports…

09 Isomechanistic neighbours

Species whose interaction profile overlaps this one, ranked by shared severity weight rather than by count — a shared contraindication counts for more than a shared minor signal. Practical use: these are the plants you should not stack with this one, because the mechanisms summate.

Species	Family	Shared classes	Jaccard
Holarrhena pubescens Kurchi	Apocynaceae	2	0.67
Sida cordifolia Bala	Malvaceae	2	0.67
Solanum virginianum Kantakari	Solanaceae	2	0.67
Tylophora indica Antamul	Apocynaceae	2	0.67
Carica papaya Papaya	Caricaceae	2	0.67
Morus alba Mulberry	Moraceae	2	0.67

10 References and notes

No citation is on record for this entry. That is itself the finding: the audit flagged it, and it is why the entry does not carry an A evidence grade.

Curator notes

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