European Journal of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences

ELEMENTAL ANALYSIS OF SIDDHA FORMULATION SAMBIRANI POO KULIGAI USING ICP-OES ANALYTICAL TECHNIQUE: RETROSPECTIVE ANALYTICAL APPROACH

M. Vijibala*, R. Karolin Daisy Rani, V. Velpandian and M. Pitchiah Kumar

ABSTRACT

As per World Health Organisation’s (WHO) data, the percentage of people using medicinal plants is considerably increased to 70–80%. Herbal raw materials (leaves, herbs, rhizomes, roots, oils) can be sources of undesirable toxic components, including heavy metals. Increases in globalization, cultural remedies from siddha, ayurveda, unani and other traditions have become more available to international consumers. According to recent research literatures it was evident that traditional medicines have traces of lead, mercury and arsenic in concentrations 100–10,000 times higher than the allowable limit values. Heavy metals such as lead (Pb), mercury (Hg), cadmium (Cd), and arsenic (As) are highly toxic even at much lower levels. Most common toxicity caused due to exposure of such heavy metals includes neurological disorders, kidney dysfunction, liver failure, reproductive disability, fetal abnormalities, cancer, atherosclerosis, reduce cognitive development etc. Hence it’s highly essential to establish quality control on raw drugs as well as finished products to ensure the safety and level of heavy metals before exposing the formulation for clinical usage. Present research work aimed at establishing the monograph on elemental composition of the siddha formulation Sambirani Poo Kuligai by using ICP-OES (inductively coupled plasma optic emission spectrometry) analytical technique. Results of the current analytical study have clearly shown that the test drug SPK has no traces of heavy metals such as arsenic, mercury, cadmium, lead and nickel. Whereas the results further confirms the presence of calcium, sodium, potassium and phosphorus at trace level. From the data’s of the present analysis it was concluded that the siddha formulation SPK has no toxic heavy metals and long term exposure of the drug will not attribute to any of the cumulative toxicity and considerably safe chronic usage.

Keywords: WHO, Heavy metals, Toxicity, Siddha, Sambirani Poo Kuligai, ICP-OES.