CONCLUSIONS
Spices and culinary herbs are rich in compounds with different and often very high antioxidant activities, and potential pharmacological effects on diabetes and its complications. Considering the well-established role of oxidative stress as a trigger factor for type 2 diabetes and diabetic complications, the antioxidant activities of spices and culinary herbs may act synergistically with their hypoglycemic properties in exerting an overall anti-diabetic action. However, the real effectiveness of these spices and herbs and/or of compounds isolated from them must be tested more thoroughly because of the lack of scientific evidence from human studies and inconsistent data from animal studies. Considering the wealth of bioactive compounds in these plants, and the encouraging results of in vitro and pilot clinical stud¬ies, further studies on their preventive and therapeutic effects against diabetes, especially of type 2, are desir-able in the future. Bearing in mind that diabetic subjects generally use different drugs, and that these foods also contain substances that may interfere with the metabo¬lism of drugs, extensive basic and clinical research to evaluate the effects of these interactions would also be desirable.