Determination of human safe upper limit for (-)-hydroxycitric acid (HCA), a weight loss supplement

Abstract

(-)-Hydroxycitric acid (HCA), a popular dietary supplement, has been shown to be active in suppressing food intake, appetite and body fat accumulation. Recently, several studies have shown the safety and efficacy of HCA. However, side effects of HCA reported include gastrointestinal symptoms, headache, and upper respiratory symptoms because of glycemic effects and should be avoided by diabetics. Therefore, the aim of this study is to establish the scheme of process for safe upper limit and maximum acceptable daily intake (ADI) of HCA. To suggest new process scheme, this study is based on the animal and cellular system for treatment of HCA. The computed safe upper limit was 0.6 mg/kg/day and 36 mg/60 kg/day in subchronic study and 43.76 mg/60 kg/day in in vitro experiment. The major organic acid in commercially available HCA-SX has been found to be HCA present to 60 %, approximately. Therefore, the safe upper limit for HCA is 21.6 mg/60 kg/day from in vivo experiment, and 26.3 mg/60 kg/day from the calculation process. As a result, the safe upper limit of HCA from in vivo and in vitro experiment is not quite different. These results suggest that the process for calculation of safe upper limit and acceptable daily intake (ADI) we used might be applied to set the safe upper limit and ADI of other functional food like aloe.