Red Clover : Traditional Support For Women 👩

Red Clover (Trifolium pratense) is a wild flowering plant belonging to the same family as peas and beans.

It’s widely used in traditional medicine as a remedy for menopause symptoms, asthma, whooping cough, arthritis, and even cancer.

However, health experts are wary of its purported benefits due to a lack of scientific evidence.

This article reviews red clover, its potential benefits, downsides, and uses.

What is Red Clover?

Red clover is a dark-pink herbaceous plant originating from Europe, Asia, and North Africa. Plus, it’s now popular throughout South America as a fodder crop to improve soil quality (1Trusted Source).

The flowering portion of red clover is used decoratively as an edible garnish or extract, and it can be extracted into essential oils (2Trusted Source).

Finally, it’s widely used as a traditional medicine to treat osteoporosis, heart disease, arthritis, skin disorders, cancer, respiratory problems like asthma, and women’s health issues, such as menstrual and menopausal symptoms.

However, little research supports these uses.

Potential benefits

Despite limited scientific evidence, red clover is used to treat a variety of conditions.

Bone health

Osteoporosis is a condition in which your bones exhibit low bone mineral density (BMD) and have become weak (3Trusted Source).

As a woman reaches menopause, a decline in reproductive hormones — namely estrogen — can lead to increased bone turnover and a decrease in BMD (4Trusted Source, 5Trusted Source).

Red clover contains isoflavones, which are a type of phytoestrogen — a plant compound that can weakly mimic estrogen in the body. Some research has shown a connection between isoflavone intake and a decrease in osteoporosis risk (6Trusted Source, 7Trusted Source, 8Trusted Source).

A 2015 study in 60 premenopausal women found that taking 5 ounces (150 mL) of red clover extract containing 37 mg of isoflavones daily for 12 weeks led to less BMD loss in the lumbar spine and neck, compared with the placebo group (9Trusted Source).

Older studies have also shown improvements in BMD after taking red clover extract (10Trusted Source, 11Trusted Source).

However, a 2015 study in 147 postmenopausal women found that taking 50 mg of red clover daily for 1 year resulted in no improvements in BMD, compared with the placebo group (12Trusted Source).

Likewise, other studies have failed to find that red clover can help treat BMD (13Trusted Source, 14Trusted Source).

Due to the large number of conflicting studies, more research is needed.

Menopausal symptoms

Red clover’s high isoflavone content is believed to help lower menopause symptoms, such as hot flashes and night sweats.

Two review studies found that 40–80 mg of red clover (Promensil) per day may help alleviate hot flashes in women with severe symptoms (5 or more per day) by 30–50%. Still, many studies were funded by supplement companies, which may lead to bias (14Trusted Source, 15Trusted Source).

Another study observed a 73% decrease in hot flashes within 3 months after taking a supplement containing numerous herbs, including red clover. Yet, due to the large number of ingredients, it’s unknown whether red clover played a role in these improvements (16Trusted Source).

Red clover has also shown mild improvements in other menopausal symptoms, such as anxiety, depression, and vaginal dryness (14Trusted Source, 17Trusted Source, 18Trusted Source).

Yet, numerous studies have shown no improvements in menopausal symptoms after taking red clover, compared with a placebo (19Trusted Source, 20Trusted Source, 21Trusted Source, 22Trusted Source, 23Trusted Source).

Currently, there’s no clear evidence that supplementing with red clover will improve menopause symptoms. Higher quality, third-party research is needed (24Trusted Source).

Skin and hair health

Red clover extract has been used in traditional medicine to promote skin and hair health.

In a randomized study in 109 postmenopausal women, participants reported significant improvements in hair and skin texture, appearance, and overall quality after taking 80 mg of red clover extract for 90 days (25Trusted Source).

Another study in 30 men showed a 13% increase in the hair growth cycle (anagen) and a 29% decrease in the hair loss cycle (telogen) when a 5% red clover extract was applied to the scalp for 4 months, compared with the placebo group (26Trusted Source).

Though promising, more research is needed.

Heart health

Some preliminary research has shown red clover may improve heart health in postmenopausal women.

One 2015 study in 147 postmenopausal women indicated a 12% decrease in LDL (bad) cholesterol after taking 50 mg of red clover (Rimostil) daily for 1 year (27Trusted Source).

One review of studies in postmenopausal women taking red clover for 4–12 months showed a significant increase in HDL (good) cholesterol and a decrease in total and LDL (bad) cholesterol (28Trusted Source).

However, a 2020 review found red clover did not reduce LDL (bad) cholesterol or increase HDL (good) cholesterol (29Trusted Source).

Despite some promising results, the authors argued that many studies were small in sample size and lacked proper blinding. Therefore, higher quality research is needed (29Trusted Source).

Moreover, these studies were performed in older, menopausal women. Thus, it’s unknown whether these effects apply to the general population.

Other claims

Many proponents of red clover claim it can help with weight loss, cancer, asthma, whooping cough, arthritis, and other conditions.

However, limited evidence shows that red clover helps with any of these illnesses.

SUMMARY

Red clover may help decrease menopausal hot flashes, though more research is needed. There’s not enough research showing it can improve cholesterol levels, strengthen bones, promote weight loss, or treat cancer, asthma, or other conditions.

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/red-clover#benefits

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