A 23-year-old woman needed a liver transplant on Christmas Day after hers stopped working because of a herbal supplement, according to her doctor.

Emily Goss, from Amarillo in Texas, had been taking four pills per day of a $50-per-bottle (£38) supplement sold by American company Alani Nu.

But in November she started to notice pain in her torso, she felt exhausted and the whites of her eyes began to turn yellow.

Doctors quickly realized her liver was failing and she was bumped to the top of a transplant waiting list in urgent need of a donor.



She was lucky to get a new liver quickly and had the operation on December 25. Her doctor believes the supplement she was taking was the cause of the critical illness.

Emily Goss, pictured with her partner Tre Norton, first developed symptoms of acute liver failure in November and had to have a transplant just a month later

Miss Norton said: ‘I just couldn’t believe that a supplement could cause something so life threatening’

‘I have my life because someone gave me their liver and I’m just so thankful,’ Miss Goss, a credit analyst for a bank, told NBC 5, a Texas news station.

Her doctor at Methodist Hospital in Dallas is convinced the supplement destroyed her liver, NBC 5 reported.

‘Many of these are advertised as natural [and] healthy,’ said Dr Jeffrey Weinstein, the medical director of liver transplantation at the hospital.

‘I view them all as drugs and I view them all as chemicals, so there should be good caution into how you use them and why you use them.’

Beware of this supplement - See photo