Dandelion: Time For Evidence On Its Benefits?

In recent decades often considered a weed, now enjoying a resurgence in popularity due its benefits for pollinators, this plant has longer-ago been enjoyed as salad (leaves) or as a drink (roots), and is typically considered to have diuretic and digestion-improving properties. So… Does it?

Diuretic

Probably! Because of the ubiquity of anecdotal evidence, this hasn’t been well-studied, but here’s a small (n=17) study that found that it significantly increased urination:

The diuretic effect in human subjects of an extract of Taraxacum officinale folium over a single day

You may be thinking, “you usually do better than an n=17 study” and yes we do, but there’s an amazing paucity of human research when it comes to dandelions, as you’ll see:

Digestion-improving

There’s a lot of fiber in dandelion greens and roots both, and eating unprocessed or minimally-processed plants is (with obvious exceptions, such as plants that are poisonous) invariably going to improve digestion just by virtue of the fiber content alone.

As for dandelions, the roots are rich in inulin, a great prebiotic fiber that indeed definitely helps:

Effect of inulin in the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome with constipation (Review)

When it comes to studies that are specifically about dandelions, however, we are down to animal studies, such as:

The effect of Taraxacum officinale on gastric emptying and smooth muscle motility in rodents

Note that this is not about the fiber; this is about the plant extract (so, no fiber), and how it gets the intestinal muscles to do their thing with more enthusiasm. Of course you, dear reader, are probably not a rodent, we can’t say for sure that this will have this effect in humans. However, generally speaking, what works for mammals works for mammals, so it probably indeed helps.

For liver health

More about rats and not humans, but again, it’s promising. Dandelion extract appears to protect the liver, reducing the damage in the event of induced liver failure:

Protective Effects of Taraxacum officinale L. (Dandelion) Root Extract in Experimental Acute on Chronic Liver Failure

In other words: the researchers poisoned the rats, and those who took dandelion extract suffered less liver damage than those who didn’t.

…and more?

It may help improve blood triglycerides and reduce ischemic stroke risk, but most of this research is still in non-human animals:

New Perspectives on the Effect of Dandelion, Its Food Products and Other Preparations on the Cardiovascular System and Its Diseases

And while we’re on the topic of blood, it likely has blood-sugar-lowering effects too; once again (you guessed it), mostly non-human animal studies, though, with some in vitro studies:

The Physiological Effects of Dandelion (Taraxacum Officinale) in Type 2 Diabetes

Want to try some?

We don’t sell it, but if you have a garden, that’s a great place to grow this very easy-to-grow plant without having to worry about pesticides etc.

Alternatively, if you’d like to buy it in supplement form, here’s an example product on Amazon 😎

Enjoy!