Supplements and Mesalazine (Systemic).
Mesalazine (Systemic), sold under the brand names Asacol, Pentasa, Salofalk, Octasa, Mezavant XL, is an aminosalicylate: it acts topically on inflamed colonic mucosa in inflammatory bowel disease.
Mesalazine (Systemic) is an aminosalicylate (5-ASA), used in ulcerative colitis and some forms of Crohn disease. The class acts locally on inflamed colonic mucosa, with mesalazine as the dominant agent in current UK prescribing. Sulfasalazine remains in use for rheumatoid arthritis. Mechanism is local inhibition of prostaglandin and leukotriene synthesis at the colonic epithelium. The supplement surface is small because the drug acts locally with limited systemic absorption. Folate depletion can occur with sulfasalazine (the sulpha moiety competes with folate metabolism), and folate supplementation is sometimes given alongside. Iron deficiency is common in active inflammatory bowel disease and may need supplementation, with the standard separation rules for oral iron and oral 5-ASA. Probiotic use during active IBD is studied but the evidence base for specific strains remains modest. NSAIDs warrant care given the IBD relapse signal.
We have not yet completed an explicit assessment of supplement interactions with Mesalazine (Systemic) in the Distil database. That is different from saying nothing exists. We surface this distinction deliberately: the Distil checker tells you when we have explicitly assessed a pair and when we have not, because both are useful information. If you take Mesalazine (Systemic) alongside a supplement, the checker below will surface anything already in our database, and the missing-item form at the bottom of the page routes uncatalogued pairs into our next curation pass.
What this list does not say. Pairs not flagged here are not implicitly safe. They are either not yet in our database, or fall outside our inclusion scope (food-supplement interactions only; for drug-drug interactions, the BNF is authoritative). Use the checker below to surface any supplement, and submit a missing item if you take something we have not catalogued.
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How we grade severity, choose what's in scope, and what we exclude.
Every call on this page is reasoned. We publish the full rubric for severity tiers, the medication inclusion logic, the evidence grades we accept, and what we deliberately leave out. About three thousand words. Worth reading once if you use this tool more than occasionally.
Read the full methodologyA full supplement review, built around you, not a generic stack.
The free checker answers one interaction question at a time. A Distil report reviews the bigger picture: your goals, diet, medications, current supplements and any blood results you provide, then shows what appears worth keeping, changing, adding or leaving out.
- what your diet already covers, so you are not adding a capsule for something food is already handling
- which evidence-graded compounds are worth considering for your goals, and which were considered but left out
- what to keep, change or stop from what you already take, plus the order to introduce anything new
- how your medications and complete supplement stack fit together, with daily timing and a clear point for reassessment
The interaction check is one section of the full report. You also get the reasoning behind each recommendation and the evidence references used.
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