Lemon Balm and medications.
Lemon Balm is in the Distil supplement database, evidence Grade B. The page below lists every medication we have explicitly assessed it against.
Lemon balm is a mint-family herb taken as a standardised extract, typically 300 to 900mg a day, with around 600mg used for acute anxiety. It appears to act on the GABA system, a calming pathway distinct from how L-theanine works, which is why the two are sometimes considered separately. The evidence is Grade B for anxiety and sleep, and for stress. The digestive use now sits at Grade C: every IBS trial we hold tested lemon balm blended with further herbs, so nothing in them can be credited to lemon balm alone, and we treat that use as emerging. The stress evidence is the clearest of the rest. Kennedy in 2004 gave healthy volunteers a single dose before a demanding laboratory task and found the 600mg dose blunted the drop in mood it caused, with people rating themselves calmer, and Haybar in 2018 gave 3g a day for eight weeks to 80 people with stable angina and found the stress score fell against placebo. Scholey's 2014 work points the same way and we treat it as supporting evidence rather than the main case, because three of its authors work for companies in the trade, one of them the supplier of the extract it tested. Sample sizes are modest throughout and the field is still small. It is often sold in combination with valerian, but the pairing carries no evidence grade of its own: the one trial of the two herbs together measured mood under a laboratory stressor rather than sleep, nothing in it can be credited to either herb alone, and its highest dose raised anxiety rather than lowering it. Two interactions are worth noting: it adds to the sedation of other CNS depressants, and because it may modulate TSH it is worth using with awareness in people with thyroid conditions. It is very safe, with mild sedation the main effect.
Below are the 13 documented pairs we have explicitly assessed for Lemon Balm: 13 caution. The pairs cluster around 2 mechanisms: Additive CNS depression and Reduced thyroid-hormone effect. Every call is cited to either a clinical reference (PMID) or the British National Formulary. Anything not listed here is either still to be assessed or beyond our database scope. The checker beneath surfaces assessments by medication, and the missing-item form at the bottom of the page routes any uncatalogued medication into our next curation pass.
Documented interactions
Last reviewed 22 June 2026. Each interaction below lists the evidence its assessment drew on: some rest on studies of the exact pair, others on mechanism evidence, where a citation may support one part of the reasoning rather than the exact combination. The evidence line on each entry says which.
Additive CNS depression
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Alprazolam?
Lemon balm and alprazolam both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Combining them may mean stronger drowsiness, slower reaction time, and a heavier morning grogginess than either tends to give on its own. Use with care, particularly around driving.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Chlordiazepoxide?
Lemon balm and chlordiazepoxide both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Combining them may mean stronger drowsiness, slower reaction time, and a heavier morning grogginess than either tends to give on its own. Use with care, particularly around driving.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Clonidine?
Lemon balm can make you drowsy, and clonidine commonly causes drowsiness and tiredness too. Taken together they may add to the sedation and slow your reactions more than either alone. Use with care, particularly around driving, and especially in the first weeks.
Evidence: No direct study of this exact combination yet; the caution rests on a plausible mechanism or on reports involving a related medicine.
Reviewer-flagged: awaiting clinical-reviewer sign-off.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Diazepam?
Lemon balm and diazepam both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Combining them may mean stronger drowsiness, slower reaction time, and a heavier morning grogginess than either tends to give on its own. Use with care, particularly around driving.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Guanfacine?
Lemon balm can make you drowsy, and guanfacine commonly causes drowsiness and tiredness too. Taken together they may add to the sedation and slow your reactions more than either alone. Use with care, particularly around driving, and especially in the first weeks.
Evidence: No direct study of this exact combination yet; the caution rests on a plausible mechanism or on reports involving a related medicine.
Reviewer-flagged: awaiting clinical-reviewer sign-off.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Lorazepam?
Lemon balm and lorazepam both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Combining them may mean stronger drowsiness and slower reactions than either tends to give on its own.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Nitrazepam?
Lemon balm and nitrazepam both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Both are used around sleep, so combining them may mean deeper-than-intended sedation and a heavier morning grogginess, made more likely by nitrazepam's long action. Take care around driving the next morning.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Oxazepam?
Lemon balm and oxazepam both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Combining them may mean stronger drowsiness, slower reaction time, and a heavier morning grogginess than either tends to give on its own. Use with care, particularly around driving.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Temazepam?
Lemon balm and temazepam both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Both are taken to help with sleep, so combining them may mean deeper-than-intended sedation and a heavier morning grogginess.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Zaleplon?
Lemon balm has a mild calming, sleep-promoting effect, so taking it with zaleplon can add to the sedation and leave you groggier than intended. Use with care, particularly around driving the next morning.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Zolpidem tartrate?
Lemon balm and zolpidem both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Both are taken for sleep, so combining them may mean deeper-than-intended sedation and a heavier morning grogginess. Take care around driving the next morning.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Zopiclone?
Lemon balm and zopiclone both calm the nervous system through overlapping pathways. Both are taken for sleep, so combining them may mean deeper-than-intended sedation and a heavier morning grogginess. Take care around driving the next morning.
Evidence: Limited human data, from small studies or case reports.
Reduced thyroid-hormone effect
Caution Does Lemon Balm interact with Levothyroxine?
Lemon balm has been shown in laboratory studies to dampen the thyroid-stimulating signal, so in theory it could work against your thyroid medication and let some underactive-thyroid symptoms creep back. This has only been seen in the test tube, not in people taking levothyroxine, so it is a precaution rather than a proven problem. If you want to take lemon balm regularly, mention it to the clinician who manages your thyroid and ask for a TSH check a few weeks later so your dose can be reviewed if needed.
Evidence: No direct study of this exact combination yet; the caution rests on a plausible mechanism or on reports involving a related medicine.
Reviewer-flagged: awaiting clinical-reviewer sign-off.
What this list does not say. Pairs not flagged here are not implicitly safe. They are either not yet in our database, or fall outside our inclusion scope. Use the checker below to surface any medication, and submit a missing item if you take something we have not catalogued.
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How the checker decides
Every result has a source
Each pair we have assessed is cited to a published study (PMID) or the British National Formulary, so you can read the source yourself.
Four kinds of answer
Severe, caution, no known interaction, and not yet assessed. A pair we have not assessed is never shown as clear.
- Severe
- Caution
- No known interaction
- Not yet assessed
Nothing in our data is not a clearance
When nothing in our data records a problem with a pair, the result says no known interaction at typical doses, which is not a clearance: your pharmacist or GP can check the pair against your full medical history.
A full supplement review, built around you, not a generic stack.
The free checker answers one interaction question at a time. A Distil report reviews the bigger picture: your goals, diet, medications, current supplements and any blood results you provide, then shows what appears worth keeping, changing, adding or leaving out.
- what your diet already covers, so you are not adding a capsule for something food is already handling
- which evidence-graded compounds are worth considering for your goals, and which were considered but left out
- what to keep, change or stop from what you already take, plus the order to introduce anything new
- how your medications and complete supplement stack fit together, with daily timing and a clear point for reassessment
The interaction check is one section of the full report. You also get the reasoning behind each recommendation and the evidence references used.
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