The liver already does the work a “cleanse” promises to do. MedlinePlus, the health information site of the US National Library of Medicine, describes it as the largest organ inside your body, and one that helps you digest food, store energy and remove poisons (MedlinePlus). It does that every day, with no kit, tea or three-day juice plan involved. If you think something is actually wrong with your liver, the NHS advice is to see a GP (NHS, liver disease). A grocery list won’t sort that out.
What the research says about detox diets
A 2015 critical review in the Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics set out to answer four questions about detox diets: are they necessary, what do they involve, do they work, and are they dangerous (Klein and Kiat, 2015). Its finding was blunt. Although the detox industry is booming, there is very little clinical evidence to support these diets.
A handful of clinical studies did report that commercial detox diets enhanced liver detoxification and removed persistent organic pollutants from the body. The review says those studies were hampered by flawed methods and small sample sizes. To the authors’ knowledge, no randomised controlled trial had tested a commercial detox diet in humans at all. So if you are asking which liver cleanse diet works, the honest answer is that the review found no randomised trial of one, and the few studies that exist are too flawed to show that any does.
What actually affects your liver
The NHS names three main causes of liver disease: obesity, an undiagnosed hepatitis infection, and alcohol misuse. Its lifestyle advice is short: try to keep a healthy weight, and don’t drink too much alcohol. It adds that vaccines are available for hepatitis A and hepatitis B, and are recommended if you’re at risk. It marks one point as important: you do not have to drink an excessive amount to risk your health, because regularly drinking just over the recommended levels can be harmful (NHS, liver disease).
Alcohol-related liver disease develops over months or years of drinking too much. The NHS says that if you stop drinking, your liver can often recover, and that anyone who does drink should keep to no more than 14 units a week, spread across 3 days or more (NHS, alcohol-related liver disease).
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is the other common one. The NHS describes it as a condition where fat builds up in your liver, often linked to being overweight, and says it does not usually cause any symptoms. Its self-help list is ordinary on purpose: eat a healthy, balanced diet, exercise regularly (at least 150 minutes a week), lose weight if you’re overweight, keep within the 14-unit limit, and don’t smoke (NHS, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease). None of those is a three-day fix.
Foods that make sense either way
The food advice that holds up is the ordinary healthy-eating kind. The NHS basics are to base meals on higher-fibre starchy foods such as wholewheat pasta, brown rice or potatoes with their skins on, and to eat at least 5 portions of a variety of fruit and veg every day (NHS, 8 tips for healthy eating).
Dates count towards that. The NHS says a 30g portion of dried fruit, such as dates, counts as 1 of your 5 A Day, but should be eaten at mealtimes rather than as a snack between meals, to reduce the impact on teeth (NHS, 5 A Day: what counts). Per 100g, Medjool dates have 277 kcal, 6.7g of fibre, 696mg of potassium and 66.5g of total sugars (USDA FoodData Central, SR Legacy record 168191). A date gives you fibre and potassium along with its sugar. It is still a lot of sugar. The NHS notes that dried fruit can be high in sugar and can be bad for your teeth, and suggests swapping it for fresh fruit, especially between meals (NHS, 5 A Day portion sizes).
Foods worth cutting back on, not “avoiding”
The things worth having less of are the ones the NHS already flags for everyone. One is alcohol, for the reasons above. Another is free sugar: the sugar added to foods and drinks, or found in honey, syrups and unsweetened fruit juice. The NHS lists sugary fizzy drinks, cakes, biscuits, pastries, sweets and alcoholic drinks as examples, and says this is the sugar to cut down on, rather than the sugar found in whole fruit and milk. It also advises eating less saturated fat, found in foods like fatty cuts of meat, sausages, butter, pies and lard (NHS, 8 tips for healthy eating).
The NHS warnings are about what you eat and drink regularly, not about a three-day break followed by a return to normal. Nobody needs to pick foods with a liver “cleanse” in mind, and dates are not a treatment for anything. They are a fruit that fits into an ordinary diet. The dates fruit section of this site has more on individual varieties, and the About Us page explains how Date Fruits handles retail and wholesale orders across Malaysia. Questions go through the Contact Us page.
This article is general information, not medical advice. If you are worried about your liver, talk to a doctor.
References
- Klein AV, Kiat H. Detox diets for toxin elimination and weight management: a critical review of the evidence. J Hum Nutr Diet. 2015;28(6):675-86. PubMed 25522674
- NHS. Liver disease. nhs.uk
- NHS. Alcohol-related liver disease (ARLD). nhs.uk
- NHS. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). nhs.uk
- NHS. 8 tips for healthy eating. nhs.uk
- NHS. 5 A Day: what counts? nhs.uk
- NHS. 5 A Day portion sizes. nhs.uk
- MedlinePlus (US National Library of Medicine). Liver diseases. medlineplus.gov
- USDA FoodData Central. Dates, medjool (SR Legacy, FDC ID 168191, 2019). fdc.nal.usda.gov