Gastrointestinal transit times of cathartics combined with charcoal

Oral activated charcoal usually is administered in toxic ingestions along with a cathartic. A study was done in volunteers to determine the rapidity of gastrointestinal transit when activated charcoal was administered with various cathartics. A control of activated charcoal was compared to the gastrointestinal transit times of activated charcoal plus the cathartics magnesium citrate, magnesium sulfate, or sorbitol. Activated charcoal alone produced a mean transit time of 23.5 hours; magnesium citrate catharsis occurred in 4.2 hours, magnesium sulfate catharsis occurred in 9.3 hours, and sorbitol catharsis occurred in 0.9 hours. Sorbitol clearly was the most rapidly acting cathartic.