Milk thistle: powerful antioxidant for liver protection & body detoxification

Better Nutrition, Feb, 1996 by James J. Gormley

Milk thistle is "one of the most ancient known herbal medicines," Daniel B. Mowrey, Ph.D., remarks in his 1993 work, Herbal Tonic Therapies.

Called Silybum marianum in Latin, this plant is an annual, or biennial, thistle which flowers from June through September, according to A Field Guide to Medicinal Plants: Eastern and Central North America (1990) by Steven Foster and James A. Duke, Ph.D.

Native to Europe, it today grows in Europe, Africa, Asia, parts of the United States (such as California) and in Mediterranean countries.

"It is an ancient plant about which many authors have written," Frank Murray pointed out in "Milk Thistle: Ancient Herb, Modern Uses" (Better Nutrition 50:18-19, 1988).

With the spines removed, the young leaves are sometimes eaten as a vegetable. Traditionally, Foster and Duke inform us, a tea is made from the whole plant, which concoction is said to "improve appetite and allay indigestion," as mentioned above.

The leaves of milk thistle have been described as "without downe, alltogether slippery, of a light greene and speckled with white and milkie spots and lines drawne divers wales," according to Geoffrey Grigson's The Englishman's Flora (1955).

Five of milk thistle's known compounds

David Hoffmann's The New Holistic Herbal (1992) notes that milk thistle includes the following compounds: silybin, silydianin, as well as silychristin, essential oil, and mucilage.

"At some point in time, milk thistle seed has been used in the treatment of gallstones; disorders of the liver, gallbaldder and spleen; as a cholagogue to promote the flow of bile [...] as a remedy for jaundice from any cause; for indigestion, dyspepsia, lack of appetite and/or digestive disorders; and to treat: peritonitis, coughs, bronchitis, uterine congestion and varicose veins," says Herbal Tonic Therapies.

The liver is a main treatment area

The liver: the body's great detoxifier. The liver is indeed our body's great detoxifier. After skin, the second largest organ in the body, the liver, is responsible for many aspects of metabolism. Since all foods, liquids and drugs pass through the liver on their way from the intestine to the bloodstream, the liver is, therefore, vulnerable to many types of toxins.

Environmental toxins include: trichloroethylene (dry cleaning fluid); benzene; methylene chloride (used to decaffeinate coffee); pesticides, such as DDT; heavy metals including arsenic and lead; workplace toxins like styrene and vinyl chloride; and a range of products found in common air pollution.

Protects the liver. In fact, as early as the 12th century, the milk thistle plant was being used as a treatment for liver disease. In 1986, Varro Tyler, Ph.D., noted that silymarin was even then successfully being marketed as a hepatoprotective drug to shield the liver from infections, such as viral hepatitis. Very often used for treatment of cirrhosis, hepatitis, liver poisoning and from chemicals or substance abuse, it is said that "silymarin, a seed extract, dramatically improves liver regeneration" in disease and poisoning, Foster and Duke point out.

Milk thistle protects the liver from certain toxic effects

In fact, a large number of published reports "show that milk thistle seed extract protects the liver against the effects of toxins such as carbon tetrachloride, hexobarbital [...] thiocetamide and salts of rare earth metals," Mowrey adds.

Laboratory experiments have demonstrated the protective effects of silymarin against both natural toxins, like those from carbon tetrachloride, a standard hepatotoxic chemical used in laboratory evaluation of liver drugs, and from the deadly Amanita (Death Cap) mushroom.

"Cures" Amanita mushroom poisoning. According to a non-controlled (for ethical reasons) clinical study by G. Vogel, in 1981, 49 patients with Death Cap mushroom poisoning were under observation in Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland and France. "Silybin was administered," Vogel wrote. "The results ranged from amazing to spectacular."

What is this silymarin, anyway? Silymarin, it should be mentioned, is not a single compound, as such, but a mixture of naturally antioxidative chemicals, which used to be termed "flavonolignans," but are more often today called "flavonoids."

According to Frank Murray in "Milk Thistle Works to Keep Your Liver In Good Health" (Better Nutrition, January 1990), "meticulous research in Germany in the early 1970's isolated the active principles in milk thistle." They are: silybin, silydianin and silychristin, which together form the substance silymarin.

"Silybin is a flavonoid," explained Michael Colgan, Ph.D., in 1989. "Bioflavonoids act generally in the body to increase membrane strength and reduce membrane permeability. Silybin appears to act in this way specifically on liver cells. The flow of chemicals across membranes is the major way in which your biochemistry works. Any substance that alters this flow can have profound effects."

Strengthens and stabilizes cell membranes. "Milk thistle appears to protect and heal the liver in three primary ways," Mowrey explains.