Kratom and Long-Term Health: What a New 2026 Study Found

What a New Study Tells Us About Long-Term Kratom Use

Kratom has been used traditionally in Southeast Asia for generations, but one of the biggest questions surrounding the plant remains surprisingly simple:

What happens to the body when people use kratom regularly over a long period of time?

A new study published in Scientific Reports in January 2026 gives us an interesting piece of that puzzle.

Researchers studied 581 adults living in Nam Phu, a community in Southern Thailand where traditional kratom use has been part of everyday life for years. The group included 285 people who had used kratom during the previous 12 months and 296 people from the same community who did not use kratom.

Rather than relying only on surveys or asking participants how they felt, researchers took blood samples and looked directly at several important indicators of health.

What Did Researchers Test?

After fasting overnight, participants received blood tests measuring things such as:

• Liver enzymes and bilirubin
• Kidney-related markers
• Complete blood counts
• Blood glucose
• HbA1c
• Albumin and other proteins

In simple terms, researchers were looking for measurable differences that might suggest problems with the liver, kidneys or blood.

And this is where the results become particularly interesting.

What Did the Study Find?

When researchers first compared the two groups, there appeared to be several differences in their blood work.

But the kratom users and non-users were also very different people in other ways.

The kratom group was predominantly male, had a lower average BMI, and had substantially higher rates of smoking and alcohol use. Researchers therefore adjusted their analysis for age, sex, BMI, smoking and alcohol consumption.

After making those adjustments, most of the apparent differences disappeared.

The researchers found no clinically significant differences in liver function or blood-count measurements associated with kratom use, and the average values in both groups remained within normal clinical ranges.

That distinction is important.

It demonstrates why good research needs to look beyond a simple comparison of "kratom users versus non-users." Something that initially appears connected to kratom could actually be associated with differences in lifestyle, body composition, smoking, alcohol use or other factors.

What About the Kidneys?

Researchers did find that kratom users had lower creatinine levels and a higher calculated eGFR, which is commonly used to estimate kidney function.

At first glance, someone might interpret a higher eGFR as meaning that kratom somehow improves kidney function.

The researchers specifically caution against that conclusion.

Creatinine is influenced by muscle mass and body composition. Because the kratom users had a significantly lower average BMI, the researchers believe differences in body composition may help explain the lower creatinine levels and resulting higher calculated eGFR.

In other words, the kidney findings were interesting, but they should not be interpreted as evidence that kratom improves kidney function.

Why Is This Study Important?

Much of the conversation surrounding kratom safety has historically relied on individual case reports, surveys, animal research or studies involving very different patterns of use.

This study is valuable because it examined a relatively large group of people living in a community where kratom has a long history of traditional use and compared them with non-users living in that same environment.

After accounting for major lifestyle differences, the researchers concluded that chronic traditional kratom use in this population was not associated with clinically significant liver or blood abnormalities.

That does not mean the study proves kratom is completely safe.

The study was observational and measured people at a single point in time, so it cannot establish cause and effect. Kratom consumption was also self-reported, researchers did not chemically analyze the kratom being consumed, and the number of female kratom users in the study was relatively small.

The researchers themselves say longer-term studies that follow people over time are still needed.

The Bigger Picture

For us, studies like this are exciting because they move the conversation about kratom away from assumptions and toward measurable data.

The takeaway isn't that one study settles every question about kratom. Science rarely works that way.

Instead, this research adds another meaningful piece to a much larger picture: among this Southern Thai population practicing traditional kratom use, researchers did not find clinically significant abnormalities in liver function or blood measurements after accounting for major lifestyle differences.

As additional research is published, our understanding of Mitragyna speciosa will continue to become clearer.

And that is exactly why continuing to study the plant matters.