Recommended foods and supplements

[Willfightit]

What are some of the foods that you recommend eating while under treatment?  What are some of the foods that may be good for your liver?  Supplements can be helpful.  Tell me about some of the supplements that you have taken and were beneficial to you.  What are some of the foods and supplements that should be avoided?

[mremeet]

If you've been reading this thread, you already know I'm no big proponent of herbs and supplements for the treatment (or management) of HCV. But FYI, milk thistle has been found to be a very safe herb, and in certain circumstances it definitely has been found to be beneficial to the liver. For instance, there's a kind of poisonous mushroom called the deathcap mushroom. If you were to eat enough of them, they would irreparably damage your liver and could easily be lethal without intervention (that's why it's called the "death cap"). One such intervention which might be used to minimize the damage of the death cap mushroom is milk thistle extract. Supposedly there are documented cases where people's lives have been saved from death cap mushroom poisoning by the administration of milk thistle (as long as the herb is administered in time). There have also been animal studies that have strongly suggested that milk thistle extract helps protects their livers when exposed to acute chemical poisons. One such acute liver poison is called carbon tetrachloride (CCl4), and when rats were exposed to lethal levels of this liver toxin, milk thistle extract was observed to protect their livers and to reduce or minimize the damage caused by CCl4. The studies showed a much higher survival rate for the poisoned rats that received milk thistle than for those that didn't (most of which died in short order). They also performed a small study using baboons which were slowly poisoned with drinking alcohol (ethanol) over the course of ~3 years (from memory). One group was given milk thistle extract (in addition to the ethanol), and one group was not. At the conclusion of the study, the group that did not receive the milk thistle was found to experience more extensive liver fibrosis than the group that did receive milk thistle.

But the catch here is, is that the damage done to our livers by viral hepatitis (hep C in most of our cases), is imparted in a different manner than an external poison or toxin (like mushrooms or CCl4). Chemical poisons directly harm the liver cells, where the damage done by the hepatitis virus is much more complicated. The damage done by the virus also involves the immune system in many ways (i.e. the immune system response to the ongoing viral assault over a long period of time plays a role in contributing to liver fibrosis and scarring). This means the mode of attack on our livers is different (when compared to toxins). And because it is different, just because milk thistle probably protects our livers against certain chemical threats, that does not mean it will also protect our livers against a viral threat. In fact, most reputable research to date shows that milk thistle has little or no benefit for protecting our livers against a viral attack. More studies are ungoing, and maybe they will eventually determine if there is any protective benefit against viral hepatitis. But if there is any benefit observed, it will almost certainly be a small one.  Don't depend on milk thistle to significantly retard the damage caused by HCV. And don't in any way be under the impression it will stop or reduce the viral activity within your body, because it won't. I've been taking milk thistle for years, and continue doing so. But only because I know it's safe, even if it doesn't work. And if it does work in some way, shape or form, even just a little bit, then I think it's worth a doallar a day to take it. Otherwise I'm peeing out a $1 a day for no good reason...oh well, I can live with that.  ;-)

Lastly, make sure you buy a reputable brand of milk thistle (should you decide to keep taking it). One big factor is to ensure that the herb is not obtained from a questionable source. If it is, you run the risk of some type of contamination, including the possibility it has been exposed to pesticides. And many of these herbs emanate from China (and are bottled here in the states). And in China, as many of us have heard by now, there has been little or no oversight on product safety. In China the use of hardcore pesticides is also commonplace, including ones that are lead based. You definitely don't need to expose your liver to anything like that, so be careful!

[stacyb321]

OK - Im really confused now.  Ive been taking MT since I was diagnosed last april and now my Hep Dr's nurse told me to stop.  She said no milk thistle or any herbs - they'll do more damage than good to your liver.  She said only take a multi-vit with no iron.  Do you think Mt would be beneficial to me being a Stage 0?

[Forseegood]

it goes, where it stops, nobody knows...I think if you have had these cam treatments work for you, youre a believer, if not, not...at least that sounds reasonable for me at this point...and please don't tell me it's all in my head, cause I just took a tylenol for a headache, and it didn't really work at all, why is my placebo effect so picky? I really want to get rid of this headache...

[aneliso]

I am new here in the forum. Why can't you take extra iron? I would think it would be good to make some extra bloodcells? Sorry if I did not already miss the answer, I didn't read everything.

[PSP-n-Me]

I tried using herbs when I first was diagnosed with HCV, ask the oldtimers here - I drove them nuts promoting herbs - well what a BIG mistake it was - After 3 months of taking this garbage (which is not cheap I went to a Naturopathic (sp) Doc and it was a "special brew" my liver enzymes tripled!!!!!

BEWARE of Chinese Herbs and DO NOT TAKE herbs on tx - you're screwing with your chances of clearing the virus

[GrandmaA]

Thanks very much for sharing the list.  I appreciate your copyiing it. That is very siimilar to the list in the Hepatitis C Handbook by a man in England named Cohen written years ago.  

I didn't want ANYONE to go out and buy licorice by what I wrote about Dr. Zhang's herbs. These are special formulas of herbs made by and tested by Dr. Zhang for a long time, and he has helped hundreds if not thousands of patients. I do not get any kick back from him. I just know what worked for me. I just like to share what worked for me. But it might not work for everyone. Like I said before I could not take his formula hepa 1 because it had too much licorice (even though I have no high blood pressure). Many people cannot try them because they are costly.

They are so strict at UC Davis Medical Center's hepatitis C support group that now they don't even allow any discussion of any alternative method (when the doctor is in the room). So lots of people left. There was a guy undergoing American Indian treatments in the sweat lodge and herbs. But I never found out if it worked because he didn't come back to the support group.

I think in 10 years there will be many more treatments and we will have many more choices of tx. I sure hope so.  I hope SVR for all.