You may not have heard of boswellia, but we’ll bet you have heard of frankincense. This dietary supplement has been used for a variety of symptoms including inflammation. This reader reported that it helped ease arthritis pain, but she encountered a most unwelcome side effect.
Pros and Cons of Boswellia:
Q. I wanted to share my experience with boswellia. I read in your column about boswellia being helpful for arthritis pain. I began taking one capsule every morning and after about a week, I noticed some relief from the joint pain.
I am a 58-year-old woman who had a hysterectomy at age 52. The hot flashes I’d had for years had begun to subside several months before starting the boswellia.
After taking boswellia for a couple of weeks, I noticed the hot flashes were back with a vengeance. I was not sure if it was the boswellia or a coincidence, so I eventually decided to quit the boswellia.
On the second day of no boswellia, I realized that the hot flashes had practically ceased. What a relief! It is my belief that boswellia caused the hot flashes to recur.
A. Boswellia comes from the resin of a tree, Boswellia serrata, which grows in Africa and India. It has long been used in Ayurvedic medicine and research has shown that it has anti-inflammatory activity (Journal of Molecular Neuroscience, May, 2016). We had not heard previously that it could trigger the return of hot flashes.
Here is a link to the history, ingredients and uses for boswellia. You can also find out more about its activity for arthritis at this link. There is a somewhat similar story about a woman who developed throat irritation and gastritis after adding this supplement to her regimen. She too got relief from joint pain, but the gastritis price was too high.
Susan in Fuquay Varina, NC, added her story to this complication:
“I also read about boswellia and ordered it online many months ago. I tried it as directed and after a few times the heartburn was horrible.
“I decided to try boswellia again because my osteoarthritis is horrible when the weather changes, before it rains or when I sleep. Again, I could not get past a few days because of the heartburn! Too bad, because this is a good product if you can stand it!”
