The interaction almost nobody knows about, and it hospitalises people. Glycyrrhizin inhibits 11β-HSD2, so cortisol acts on the mineralocorticoid receptor: sodium and water retained, potassium lost, blood pressure up. Reported at intakes as low as ~100 mg glycyrrhizin per day sustained.
Also known as: liquorice, Glycyrrhiza glabra, glycyrrhizin, glycyrrhizic acid, mulethi. Category: seasoning.
Blocks the enzyme that inactivates cortisol in the kidney, so cortisol acts on the mineralocorticoid receptor. Produces the picture of excess aldosterone with low aldosterone: sodium retention, potassium loss, hypertension.
Produces hypokalaemia, metabolic alkalosis, oedema and hypertension — pseudohyperaldosteronism, with aldosterone SUPPRESSED. Case reports include rhabdomyolysis, hypokalaemic paralysis and cardiac arrhythmia. It resolves on withdrawal, but slowly (weeks).
Glycyrrhizin inhibits 11β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 2, the enzyme that converts cortisol to inactive cortisone inside the kidney. Cortisol then reaches the mineralocorticoid receptor, and the body behaves as if aldosterone were high while aldosterone is actually suppressed: sodium and water retained, potassium excreted, blood pressure up.
What to watch for. Rising blood pressure, swelling, muscle weakness or cramps, and on a blood test low potassium with metabolic alkalosis. Reported at sustained intakes around 100 mg glycyrrhizin per day; severe cases have included hypokalaemic paralysis, rhabdomyolysis and arrhythmia. It resolves on stopping, but over weeks rather than days.
Via 11β-HSD2 inhibition (pseudohyperaldosteronism)
Digoxin (narrow therapeutic index)
This list is what is IN the table. It is not the set of substances this interacts with — that set is
larger and partly unknown, and the mechanism is the thing to carry to a substance we have not listed.
A clean result means NO DOCUMENTED INTERACTION IN THIS DATASET. It does not mean safe, and it is not a clearance. Most substances are not in this dataset at all, and for many pairs that are, nobody has ever studied the combination.
Serotonergic drugs and the serotonin-toxicity mechanism
Dietary tyramine and L-dopa loads
The major cytochrome P450 pathways: CYP3A4, CYP2D6, CYP1A2, CYP2C9, CYP2C19 — inhibition and induction
P-glycoprotein inhibition and induction
11β-HSD2 inhibition (the licorice mechanism) and the potassium consequences that follow it
QT prolongation as an additive pharmacodynamic axis
Culinary seasonings and common foods with documented pharmacological activity
A selected set of narrow-therapeutic-index drugs where those shifts matter most
The endocannabinoid enzymes and transport: FAAH, MAGL, endocannabinoid membrane transport, CB1 and CB2
Additive CNS depression and GABA-A positive modulation — the alcohol / benzodiazepine / opioid / kava axis
The phytocannabinoids delta-9-THC, cannabidiol and the converted cannabinoids, as both substrates and inhibitors
Synthetic full CB1 agonists as a class, and why they are pharmacologically unlike cannabis
CYP2E1, and phase-2 glucuronidation and sulfation where a specific entry names them
The sedative and potentiator botanicals of the kava literature, and dietary L-dopa from Mucuna
Not in this dataset
Any substance not named in this dataset — which is most substances. There are tens of thousands of marketed drugs and this table holds fewer than a hundred entries.
Phase-2 conjugation (UGT, SULT, NAT2, COMT) except where a specific entry names it. The oilahuasca corpus turns heavily on phase 2 and this engine models it only in passing.
Pharmacogenomics. CYP2D6 and CYP2C19 are strongly polymorphic; a poor metaboliser and an ultra-rapid metaboliser can have opposite outcomes from the same pair, and this engine does not know your genotype.
Dose, timing, duration, formulation and route — all of which change whether a documented interaction is clinically real for you.
Renal and hepatic impairment, age, pregnancy, and body composition.
Bleeding and antiplatelet risk, hypoglycaemia, anticholinergic load, and most other pharmacodynamic axes beyond the ones listed above. Additive CNS depression and GABA-A modulation ARE now modelled — see the covers list — but the absence of a sedation finding still only means the agents you named are not on that axis in this dataset.
Herb–herb interactions outside the named entries, and essentially the whole botanical world: most plants have no interaction literature at all.
Allergy, intolerance, and contamination or adulteration of unregulated products.
Anything published after the last-reviewed date below.
Bleeding and antiplatelet risk, which is the mechanism that matters most for garlic, ginkgo and several other common supplements. It is not modelled at all, so a clean result says nothing about it.
Whether any of the natural FAAH, MAGL or transport inhibition reported in vitro occurs at all at a dose a person would take. For most of these compounds nobody has measured it.
The actual contents of an unregulated cannabinoid product. This engine models named compounds; an unidentified isomer or side-product in a converted-cannabinoid product is outside it by construction.
Dose. Every cannabinoid interaction here scales with dose, and consumer product labelling for this category is repeatedly found inaccurate in published surveys.
Inhalation-specific hazards — thermal degradation products, diluents chosen for rheology rather than for inhalation toxicology, and carrier and adulterant contamination.
101 substances, 33 mechanisms,
101 citations. Last reviewed .
Primary literature (every DOI resolved against the Crossref API) and FDA drug labelling. There is no free, openly-licensed, comprehensive drug-interaction dataset to draw on; NLM retired its Drug Interaction API on 2024-01-02 and DrugBank's interaction set is a commercial licence.
References
Størmer FC, Reistad R, Alexander J (1993). Glycyrrhizic acid in liquorice—Evaluation of health hazard. Food and Chemical Toxicology. doi:10.1016/0278-6915(93)90080-I
Omar HR, Komarova I, El-Ghonemi M, et al. (2012). Licorice abuse: time to send a warning message. Therapeutic Advances in Endocrinology and Metabolism. doi:10.1177/2042018812454322
Farese RV Jr, Biglieri EG, Shackleton CHL, Irony I, Gomez-Fontes R (1991). Licorice-Induced Hypermineralocorticoidism. New England Journal of Medicine. doi:10.1056/NEJM199110243251706
Every DOI above was resolved against the Crossref API on 2026-09-09 and the returned
title checked against the one printed here. Three DOIs in the first draft resolved to real but different
papers and were corrected before publication.