People mainly take Milk Thistle for pain & inflammation, mood. Based on 77 first-hand reports and 26 meta-analyses & systematic reviews in the medical literature. Ranked #452 of 1,974 overall.
Of reports that state an outcome, 73% are positive.
Of the people who reported each effect, the share who said it got better.
Systematic reviews and meta-analyses from PubMed, with their published conclusions.
3+ meta-analyses or systematic reviews and 10+ randomized controlled trials in humans. The grade measures how much human research exists — read the conclusions below for what it found.
Conclusion: Silymarin can regulate energy metabolism, attenuate liver damage, and improve liver histology in NAFLD patients. However, the effects of silymarin will need to be confirmed by further research.
PubMed 38579127 ↗Conclusion: Silymarin is generally very well tolerated, with a low incidence of adverse events and no treatment-related serious adverse events or deaths reported in clinical trials. For maximum benefit, treatment with silymarin should be initiated as early as possible in patients with fatty liver disease and other distinct liver disease manifestations such as acute liver failure, when the regenerative potential of the liver is still high and when removal of oxidative stress, the cause of cytotoxicity, can achieve the best results.
PubMed 32065376 ↗Conclusion: Despite this there is no quality randomized trial to definitively demonstrate its utility. While, intravenous silibinin has a low toxicity, unanswered is whether it is useful in protecting the liver in cases of amanitin-containing mushrooms toxicity, and whether earlier administration would likely improve outcomes.
PubMed 36222816 ↗Conclusion: Given the insufficiency of evidence from these trials, no recommendation is made for the use of herbs as galactogogues. Well-designed and well-conducted clinical trials that address the above limitations are necessary to generate a body of evidence as a basis for recommendations regarding herbal galactogogues.
PubMed 23468043 ↗As stated by users — not a recommendation. Follow the label or your doctor.
How often each side effect came up across all reports.
Verbatim quotes, shortened only — each links to the original discussion.
“a cycle of milk thistle is good for your livers as it's really high in glutathione”
“plus I use milk thistle with NAC every so often for liver and kidney repair”
“I take milk thistle because some of my snp's cause me to have elevated liver enzymes”
“NAC and milk thistle are great for preventing hangovers.”
“Milk thistle, NAC, and even the oft touted sulforaphane are good places to start.”
User data from public discussions; research from PubMed. Information only, not medical advice — talk to a doctor before starting, stopping or combining anything. Data updated October 2, 2026. How we rate