Herbs That Detox Liver

Herbal medicine offers some gentle treatments to reduce the buildup of toxins in the liver. Herbal detoxification is a safe process that you can include in your daily life to improve your liver health and restore vitality to your general health. Although herbal liver detoxification can seem complicated, many common spices can help cleanse your liver, so including detoxifying herbs in your diet can prove quite simple and pleasantly tasty.

Function

• For centuries, Eastern cultures have used herbs to heal the liver problems associated with a rich diet and the overconsumption of fatty foods and alcohol. Western medicine has begun to embrace the gentle and safe healing and detoxification properties of herbs. Using common herbs such as rosemary and turmeric can help clean toxins out of the liver and stimulate the production of healthy gastric juices.

Milk Thistle

• Milk thistle is a power antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and liver-cleansing herb that has received attention in the media for its healing effect on liver damage. According to "The One Earth Herbal Sourcebook" by Tillotson et al., milk thistle has been tested on patients with liver damage and was found to be effective in helping them get better. Milk thistle has repeatedly shown that it consistently causes liver healing in patients suffering all but the most serious types of liver damage.

How to Take Herbs

• Many herbs are common spices, making it easy to include them in your food to get the healing herbs you need. Sometimes, you may need to get an herb in the form of a capsule, concentrated powder or tincture. If an herb is not tasty, requires special processing, or needs to be taken in high concentration, it is a good time to consider taking the herb as a pill or droplet.

  Although herbs are best taken in a tincture, which is an alcohol preparation of the herb taken by droplet, many herbs like milk thistle can be more commonly found in gelatin capsule pills in most grocery, food and health stores. You are more likely to find milk thistle and other herbal remedies in tincture form if you check health food stores and vitamin stores, or get a special preparation from an herbalist. If you can't find the herb in tincture form, or if it is too expensive that way, you can still use the capsules.

Rosemary

• Rosemary is a gentle herb that has been shown to have antitoxin and anti-inflammatory effects throughout the body's organs, and particularly in the liver. Rosemary's antioxidant properties fight toxins in the liver. In addition to its cleansing effects, rosemary also increases blood flow, which can help move fresh blood in and out of the liver. Rosemary is a common spice in Italian cooking. Although it is a healing herb, it can easily be added to spaghetti sauce, pizza and other savory treats, making it simple and tasty to receive the liver-cleansing benefits.

Chamomile

• Chamomile is commonly used in herbal medicines to detox and heal the liver, particularly in herbal medicine practices in South America. Chamomile stimulates the digestive system to relieve pain in the liver and the surrounding digestive regions. Its anti-inflammatory properties help reduce swelling in the liver caused by excess toxins, giving healthy tissue more access to fresh blood flow. If you are having pain in your liver, a common remedy is to drink two cups of chamomile tea with a bit of ginger to help relax your liver and cleanse toxins from its tissues.