How do you take your milk thistle?

[Meso]

I was just wondering what doses you guys are taking milk thistle at?
I'm running a low dose of test e for 12 wks.

[DrugsrGood]

suppository...

[KGBnine]

suppository...

Gross. I take mine with water.

[icewind]

suppository...

Smartass...

If you take testosterone enanthate....then you should have no problems with liver toxicity, as testosterone's effect on liver are minimal.

I'm not sure about the dosages....I used to take 8 caps per day.

[seanw]

400mg per day

What is Milk Thistle ?

Family: Asteraceae
Genus and Species: Silybum marianum

Milk thistle is an herbaceous annual or biennial plant with a dense prickly flower head with purplish tubular flowers. Milk thistle is an edible plant native to southern Europe, southern Russia, Asia Minor, and nothern Africa, and has been used for food in the countries surrounding the Mediterranean for a long time as well as a tonic herb for the liver. Virtually all parts of the plant have been used as food with no known toxicity. Milk thistle was introduced to North America by European colonists.

Today, milk thistle is best known as a producer of liver protectant known as silymarin, a group of milk thistle flavonoids. The milk thistle in commerce is a standardized extracts prepared from the fruits (seeds) of Silybum marianum. Like Ginkgo biloba, milk thistle is required to be standardized and rendered to concentrated forms to be effectively used for desired medicinal purposes, which, in this case, is as a hepatoprotectant. In general, milk thistle extracts are standardized to a concentration of 70-80% of flavone lignans including isosilybinin, silybinin, silychristin, and silydianin, which are collectively called silymarin.


History


Milk thistle has been known in Europe and other Mediterranean countries since ancient times. Theophrastus mentioned about milk thistle around 4th century, B.C. Dioscorides wrote about the medicinal value of milk thistle, and Pliny the Elder wrote on the improvement of bile flow by milk thistle, calling it "Silybum" around the 1st century, A.D. Nicholas Culpeper, an English herbalist mentioned in 1650 that milk thistle is effective for removing liver obstructions. Von Haller documented the use of milk thistle for liver ailments in 1744. Milk thistle has been mentioned as a folkloric remedy for asthma, cancer, catarrh, chest pains, dropsy, fever, hepatitis, rabies, jaundice, vaginal discharge, malaria, plague, spasms, and spleen problems. Milk thistle has been under scientific and clinical investigation since turn of the last century, mainly in Germany. In the 1960s, German scientists identified a group of active ingredients from milk thistle, mainly from the seeds, and named them collectively as "silymarin". The preparation of milk thistle fruits and seeds were approved by German Commission E as a highly safe and effective herb for liver health.


Usage

German Commission E approved the internal use of crude milk thistle fruit preparations for dyspeptic complaints. Standardized extracts (usually ranging in silymarin concentration from 70 to 80%) are approved for toxic liver damage and as a supportive treatment for chronic inflammatory liver disease and hepatic cirrhosis.

Silymarin is known to protect the liver by altering and strengthening the structure of outer cell membranes of hepatocytes (liver cells), preventing toxins from entering the liver cells, and by stimulating the regenerative ability of the liver and the formation of new hepatocytes through the activation of an enzyme nucleolar polymerase A, which leads to the increase in ribosomal protein synthesis and cell division. Silymarin, as an anti-oxidant, may also reduce damages to liver cells caused by chronic use of certain prescription drugs. The silybin component of sillymarin has been related to cholesterol-lowering effects. Through the capability to increase bile solubility, sylimarin may also help prevent or alleviate gallstones.

Dose: 12-15 grams per day of powdered seed is recommended for making infusions or other preparations to be taken orally. For standardized extract, 200-400 mg of silymarine per day is recommended.

Side Effects: No side effects are known for crude preparation, as milk thistle is a food, and a relative of artichoke. For standardized extract with high concentration of sylimarine, a mild laxative effect has been observed occasionally.


Chemistry and Pharmacology

A rather complete chemical composition list of milk thistle can be found in Dr. Duke's Phytochemical and Ethnobotanical Databases. Milk thisle seeds contain 1.5-3% flavonolignans, collectively called silymarin; 20-30% fixed oils, of which approximately 60% is linoleic acid, approximately 30% is oleic acid, and approximately 9% is palmitic acid; 25-30% protein; 0.038% tocopherol; 0.63% sterols, including choleterol, campeterol, stigmasterol, and sitosterol; and some mucilage. [Herbal Medicine - Expanded Commission E monographs, by Mark Blumenthal, Alicia Goldberg, and Josef Brinckmann, first edition, 2000]. Silymarin's constituents are isosilybinin, silybinin, silychristin, and silydianin, of which silybinin accounts for approximately 50% of silymarin. [Dr. Duke's Essential Herbs, by James A Duke, 1999].

[AVAGO]

Smartass...

If you take testosterone enanthate....then you should have no problems with liver toxicity, as testosterone's effect on liver are minimal.

I'm not sure about the dosages....I used to take 8 caps per day.

How about going back and deleting some bro thats like 4 times you have posted this now..............

[Mesomorphyl]

To reitterate what others have said... You will not really need milk thistle with just an injectable. If you ever add orals, and you take as directed you will hit about 500mg. Also I find if you take astralgus(sp?) and b-6 along with milk thistle it will help the liver as they will work synergistically.

[RUballs0514]

are you planning on using winny in this cycle, cause if you aren't then you prolly don't need the milk thistle.

[nate3422]

600mg/day

[Meso]

Thanks guys, I think I'll just run the recomended dose since I'm not running any 17aa's.