You might not think about your liver too often, but a healthy liver is critical. The liver is a mini-factory in the body. It is responsible for filtering what comes into the body and extracting nutrients. The liver’s jobs include: storing energy, helping build muscles, keeping pollutants out of the body, producing bile, and removing waste products from nutrient breakdowns.

To help understand how to support liver health, and ensure it can properly maintain its critical function, the Wellness Advisor recommends the following products to help maintain liver health:

SAM-e: SAM-e is synthesized from the essential amino acid methionine. SAM-e is a naturally occurring molecule and plays an important role in a process called methylation. Methylation is a key step in the biosynthesis of DNA, RNA, phospholipids, proteins, neurotransmitters, and other compounds. SAM-e has been used to protect the liver and many clinical trials have focused on the effect of SAM-e on cholestasis, a failure of bile flow. SAM-e may exert beneficial effects on the liver through a variety of mechanisms, including an increase of glutathione concentrations, a major antioxidant in the liver that detoxifies and limits oxidative damage. SAM-e may also improve bile flow, decrease the negative effects of hormones on bile flow and composition, decrease fatty deposition in the liver, and may protect against alcohol related liver damage.

Milk Thistle: Milk Thistle preparations have been used for liver health for over 2000 years. Although its use declined over time, renewed interest in the clinical use of milk thistle for liver health grew again in the 1930’s and continues to grow. Milk thistle is one of the best documented therapeutic agents available to treat various types of liver problems. Milk thistle’s active ingredient, silymarin, is thought to be liver protective by stimulating both the synthesis of bile salts and regenerative ability of the liver. Silymarin protects the liver from toxins by stabilizing and protecting liver cell membranes, thus preventing the penetration of toxins into the interior of the cell. Internal ingestion of standardized preparations has shown to be liver protective in humans.