Grapefruit

Grapefruit is a citrus fruit grown in sub-tropical places. It is bigger than an orange and is often more sour, but many types of grapefruit have other flavors.

Grapefruit
A basket of grapefruit
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
Division:	Magnoliophyta
Class:	Magnoliopsida
Subclass:	Rosidae
Order:	Sapindales
Family:	Rutaceae
Genus:	Citrus
Species:	C. paradisi
Binomial name
Citrus paradisi Macfad.

The tree which the grapefruit grows on is normally 5-6 meters tall but can reach up to 15 meters tall. It has dark green leaves that measure up to 150mm and has white flowers that grow 5cm in length. The fruit itself can grow 10-15cm in diameter. In 2007, there were about 5,061,023 tons of grapefruits made worldwide, most of the tons coming from the U.S. There are many different kinds of grapefruits with different color pulp. The most popular colors are red, white and pink. There are also a wide range of flavors grapefruits have, from highly acidic and bitter to sweet.

Drug interactions

While they were doing research for a drug against high blood pressure in 1989, scientists found that its effectiveness was worse in people who had eaten grapefruit.^[1] Two years later, at the start of 1991, they published their findings in the scientific journal The Lancet.^[2] Since then, several substances that are present in the grapefruit and grapefruit juice have been identified; these substances cause side-effects in certain drugs. Grapefruit and grapefruit juice interact with numerous drugs, resulting in numerous adverse effects including bone marrow suppression, nephrotoxicity, abnormal heart rhythm, rhabdomyolysis, hypotension, gastrointestinal bleeding, dizziness, and respiratory depression.^[3]

Another effect is that grapefruit compounds may inhibit the absorption of drugs in the intestine. If a drug is not absorbed, then not enough of it is in the blood to have a therapeutic effect. Each affected drug has either a specific increase of effect or decrease.^[4]One whole grapefruit or a glass of 200 ml (7 US fl oz) of grapefruit juice may cause drug overdose toxicity.^[3] Very often, the fact that a drug has interactions with grapefruit or grapefruit juice is indicated on the packaging, or the usage instructions.^[3]