Taking Propecia with Saw Palmetto

Is it safe to take propecia and saw palmetto together, and if so how much saw palmetto? Can either of these effect facial hair growth or acne?

BerkeleyWellness.com states: “Because dietary supplements are essentially unregulated in the U.S., you can’t be sure what you’re getting when you buy a saw palmetto product (or any supplements). There are many preparations on the market (with different amounts of fatty acids, for instance, and some in combination with other ingredients of questionable benefit). They may not have the same effects.”

For the same reason, there is no way of knowing how much saw palmetto is actually in a tablet even when a specific dose is written on the bottle. Furthermore the exact mechanism of how and why saw palmetto works is not well understood. It may have an effect on DHT like finasteride, but nobody knows for sure as the science has not defined the actions. It has been sold in natural food stores for the treatment of benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH), treating men who can not urinate well. One may argue that it may also help with male pattern baldness (MPB), but there are no medical studies to support either claim.

There is no way to tell you if it is safe to use saw palmetto with finasteride (Propecia) or if it will affect facial hair growth or acne. If saw palmetto is really a blocker for DHT as some feel is the case, then you could be increasing the dose of DHT blocking to the point of decreasing your libido (a bad trade). I do not recommend saw palmetto for MPB for the aforementioned reason.