Liver cleanses claim they have detoxifying benefits. Are they safe?

In an age of normalized “detoxes” and “cleanses,” supplements marketed to cleanse your liver have garnered popularity in recent years.

Proponents of liver cleanses claim it can detoxify your body and help you achieve weight loss. On TikTok, videos touting the so-called benefits of liver cleanses have reached thousands of users. 

What content creators often fail to mention are the harmful risks associated with consuming liver cleanse supplements. Today, we’ll break down why liver cleanses might be doing you more harm than good, and clue you into the tangible steps you can take to promote liver health.

What are liver cleanses?

The liver has hundreds of functions. It plays an important role in handling metabolism, digesting nutrients, fighting off infections, and detoxifying harmful substances that pass through the body, says Dr. Rotonya M. Carr, MD, FACP, the division head of Gastroenterology at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

“There are a variety of products that are marketed as liver cleanses,” says Carr. Liver cleanse supplements, taken orally, are the most popular. They can be purchased online or over the counter. These types of products “claim to clean out the liver [and] help the liver do its job,” she says. 

Milk thistle and turmeric are common active ingredients in liver cleanses, per Johns Hopkins Medicine. 

Are liver cleanses safe?

One of the liver’s primary functions is to clear toxins out of the body. Not only are liver cleanses “not necessary,” they “can be quite harmful to liver health and general health,” Carr emphasizes. 

“The majority, if not all, of these products have not gone through FDA approval.” So, “we do not consider them safe,” Carr says. 

Carr explains one of the greatest concerns surrounding liver cleanse products is the possibility of consuming ingredients at unknown or high concentrations, which can pose risks of liver failure. Carr’s clinic has performed liver transplantation surgery on patients who have consumed these types of products. When the liver fails, “the only way to survive is to replace the liver through a transplant,” she says. 

What are the first signs of a bad liver?

In the United States, 4.5 million people have been diagnosed with liver disease, according to the National Center of Health Statistics. 

There are many different types of liver disease, Carr says. During the beginning stages, you might not even realize anything’s wrong. The liver has backup systems that help it to complete its normal functions even when a part of it is injured, Carr says. “Patients may feel quite fine physically, because the liver is such an extraordinary organ.” 

That’s why it’s so important to schedule annual checkups with your primary care provider to receive “a set of blood tests that can measure your liver enzymes,” Carr stresses. “Elevations in those liver enzymes can sometimes be the very earliest signs that something is harming your liver.”

As liver disease progresses, symptoms will vary. Patients may experience fatigue, jaundice or ascites, which is an accumulation of fluid in the abdomen, Carr says. “Most commonly, people are not very symptomatic until liver disease is quite severe,” she adds. 

Severe complications of liver disease include confusion, vomiting of blood, or “bowel movements that are black in color,” which may indicate internal bleeding in the intestinal tract, she says. 

How to promote a healthy liver 

There are actionable steps you can take to mitigate the risk of developing liver disease. 

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When it comes to liver health, maintaining a healthy diet is paramount. Make sure to drink plenty of water, eat vegetables, and consume lean, good quality protein, Carr recommends.

“The other part of that equation is to avoid things that harm the liver,” Carr says. Avoid “alcohol and other toxins, including many of these herbal substances or liver cleanses that can cause damage to the liver,” she says.