Bromelain in pregnancy and breastfeeding

What NCCIH says about safety

When taken orally, bromelain seems to be well tolerated. The most commonly reported side effects have been stomach upset and diarrhea. If you take any type of medicine, talk with your health care provider before using bromelain or other herbal products; some herbs and medicines interact in harmful ways. Little is known about whether it’s safe to use bromelain during pregnancy or while breastfeeding.

Quoted in full from NCCIH so nothing is lost in summarising. Where they say “little is known”, that means the studies do not exist — not that the herb is known to be safe, and not that it is known to be harmful.

How much is actually known

A small number of studies have been done on the use of bromelain taken orally (by mouth) for reducing symptoms of sinusitis and reducing pain and swelling after wisdom tooth extraction. For other conditions, either very little research has been done or studies have only evaluated products that contain a mixture of bromelain and other ingredients, and therefore the effects of bromelain alone are unclear. In 2022, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a drug product containing bromelain for topical use for debridement (removal of dead tissue or contaminants) of severe burns in adults. The product is also approved for this purpose in the European Union.

What the research has found

There is not enough high-quality research to say whether oral bromelain should be recommended for sinusitis. Some studies suggest that oral bromelain might be helpful for reducing some symptoms associated with wisdom tooth surgery. Debridement with topical bromelain has been successfully administered by health professionals as an alternative to surgical debridement.

Before you take this

Dose and form change the answer completely. A culinary amount of a spice, a cup of tea, and a concentrated supplement extract are three different things, and most research is done on the last of them.

Supplements are also not regulated like medicines, so strength and purity vary between products. Bring the actual bottle to your midwife, doctor or pharmacist — that conversation is worth more than any page, including this one.