has anyone heard of taking Milk Thistle as an aid in treating psoriasis? My daughter has done research on it due to hepatitis C and found literature on the subject. If so, does it help?

Hi Annie,
I just googled "milk thistle psoriasis" and came up with this discussion from the NPF's discussion of dietary supplements:Hi Annie,
Finally, there's one school of thought that suggests that a healthy liver will help improve psoriasis. I'm not aware of any studies which support that school of thought.
It has been shown that bile supplements can lead to significant improvement in psoriasis. Bile acts as a 'physico-chemical' barrier that (among other things) reduces partially digested proteins and bacterial endotoxin from being absorbed. Milk thistle/silymarin has been shown to increase the production of bile in the liver and the excretion of bile from the gall bladder.
http://www.med-owl.com/psoriasis/ti...page=Bile+Salts
Silibinin from milk thistle decreases the production of TNF in the liver in response to bacterial proteins. Milk thistle also reduces the production of adhesion molecules like ICAM, VCAM and E-selectin, which are elvated in psoriasis and believed to be part of the problem.

The Milk Thistle bottle says to be taken with food. I like to take it three times a day and when I do not have breakfast is it ok to take it hungry?
I am doing the apple three day cleansing also so I am having much food these days, is it still ok to take milk thistle?

has anyone heard of taking Milk Thistle as an aid in treating psoriasis? My daughter has done research on it due to hepatitis C and found literature on the subject. If so, does it help? I believe that the evidence linking Milk Thistle as being helpful for psoriasis is anecdotal at best, which basically means that there are folks that have said that it has helped their PS. You can find some additional info on Milk Thistle here >>> http://ods.od.nih.gov/Health_Inform...plements.a spx<<< I don't recall seeing anything specific to Milk Thistle and PS, but there is a great deal of info.

I read that in traditional chinese medicine milk thistle is prescribed to relieve the "excess heat" that traditionalists believe causes p. I took an extract for about a month and it didn't much for me, but everyones different, there's no harm in trying.