Activated carbon

Activated carbon is a product made from coal by treating it with heat and steam or chemicals. This process creates many micropores and increases its surface area, making it highly absorbent.

In medicine, activated carbon is often used as an absorbent to absorb toxins and other harmful substances in the gastrointestinal tract. It can be used in cases of poisoning or overdose with drugs or chemicals, as well as to reduce gas formation and reduce unpleasant odor from the stomach.

Activated charcoal can help bind toxins and prevent them from being absorbed into the bloodstream, which helps them pass out of the body through stool. It is often taken as a tablet or powder mixed with liquid.

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Indications activated charcoal

Indications for use

• The medication is used as a detoxifying agent for exogenous and endogenous toxicoses of various origins.
• Activated carbon is also used as part of complex therapy for food poisoning, salmonellosis, and dysentery.
• It is used in cases of poisoning with drugs that are classified as psychotropic, sleeping pills, narcotic drugs, alkaloids, heavy metal salts and other poisons.
• It is used for diseases of the gastrointestinal tract that cause symptoms of dyspepsia and flatulence.
• Indicated for food and drug allergies.
• It is used for hyperbilirubinemia, which occurs against the background of viral hepatitis and other types of jaundice.
• It is used for hyperazotemia, which occurs due to renal failure.
• Indicated for use to reduce symptoms of intestinal gas formation in ultrasound and radiographic examinations.

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Release form

Activated carbon is produced in the form of black tablets, having a flat-cylindrical shape and a score line, with a slightly rough surface. Each tablet weighs two hundred and fifty milligrams and contains the active substance - activated carbon - two hundred and fifty milligrams, as well as the auxiliary substance - potato starch - forty-seven milligrams.

Activated carbon is packaged in ten tablets in a cell-less paper blister with a polyethylene coating. Each of these packages is placed several pieces in a group cardboard pack and is supplied with a leaflet with instructions.

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Pharmacodynamics

The medicine has an adsorbing effect. In the gastrointestinal tract, activated carbon is able to bind and remove toxic substances of endogenous and exogenous origin of various natures from the body. These substances also include various types of microbes and microbial toxins, food allergens, drugs, poisons, alkaloids, heavy metal salts and gases.

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Pharmacokinetics

The drug does not have the ability to be absorbed in the gastrointestinal tract when taken orally. The approximate time that activated carbon remains in the digestive system before it leaves the body is about twenty-five hours. The drug is not metabolized in the gastrointestinal tract and is eliminated from the body unchanged through feces.

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Dosing and administration

Activated carbon is used in the form of whole tablets. It can also be used, pre-crushed, in the form of a suspension in water. In this case, the required amount of medicine is crushed in half a glass of water.

Tablets for stomach pain are used one hour before meals or any medications. The dosage of the drug for adults is one tablet for every ten kilograms of the patient's weight. The maximum single dose can be eight grams. Activated carbon is used three or four times a day.

Children aged six years and over take activated carbon at a rate of fifty milligrams per kilogram of the patient's weight three times a day. The maximum single dose of the medication can be up to two hundred milligrams per kilogram of the patient's body weight.

The course of treatment for acute diseases is from three to five days. In case of allergic manifestations and chronic diseases, the duration of treatment with the drug can last up to fourteen days.

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Use activated charcoal during pregnancy

Activated carbon is not absorbed into the body and does not enter the systemic bloodstream. Therefore, its use is indicated during pregnancy and lactation.

Contraindications

• The presence of individual intolerance to the medication.
• Existing gastric ulcer and duodenal ulcer in the acute stage.
• History of ulcerative colitis.
• Existing bleeding from the gastrointestinal tract.
• The occurrence of intestinal atony.
• The patient's age is under six years.

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Side effects activated charcoal

• The occurrence of constipation or diarrhea.
• Long-term use of activated carbon (more than two weeks) can lead to impaired absorption of calcium and vitamins.
• When using tablets, the stool becomes dark in color.

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Overdose

Overdosing on these stomach pain pills may cause symptoms of nausea and vomiting, as well as constipation.

In this case, the use of the medication is cancelled and laxatives are prescribed.

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Interactions with other drugs

The drug reduces the effectiveness of all drugs taken simultaneously with it. Activated carbon leads to an increase in the rate of elimination of drugs with a long half-life, namely Carbamazepine, Phenobarbital, Diphenylsulfone. Oral administration of the drug leads to a five-fold increase in the clearance of Digoxin.

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Storage conditions

Activated carbon - the drug is kept out of reach of children at an ambient temperature not exceeding twenty-five degrees Celsius.

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Shelf life

Activated carbon has a shelf life of 24 months from the date of manufacture.

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