Herbal medicine and liver disease, for any conclusion we need to do more studies

Abstract

Dear Editor,

I interestedly read the published article by Kalantari et al. in your journal recently.1 Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is one of the main causes of liver disease in Iran.2, 3 The standard therapy with alpha interferon and ribavirin can eradicate the virus in about 50% of patients.4 Therefore, it necessitates studying other HCV infection treatment drugs.

There are some reports about safety and efficacy of herbal medicine in chronic liver disease management.5, 6 The most known herbal medicine is Silybum marianum (milk thistle) which is reported to be safe with no serious adverse effects.5

First of all, I would like to mention that insulin resistance has an important role in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease and HCV infection.7 Considering the proposed role of oxidative stress in pathogenesis of liver disease, using antioxidants, such as silymarin, has been reported to be effective in treatment of different types of liver disease, especially nonalcoholic fatty liver disease.8-10