Nutritional Surplus
Can you overdo the supplements? America’s dietary supplement industry is big business, with an estimated 85,000 products in the marketplace. But believe it or not, most people don’t need them. “For most healthy individuals, supplements are not a necessity,” says Emily Smith, MD, a Chicago-based endocrinologist and obesity medicine physician at Form Health, an online […]
Quality Supplements
What to look for in a label Choosing a supplement can be confusing. Not all brands are equal, and how do you know that you’re actually getting what the label says? “Quality matters if you hope to see a benefit and reduce the risk of harm,” says Melinda Ring, MD, executive director at the Osher […]
Mayo Clinic Q&A: Dietary Supplements Useful in Some Situations, but Also Can Be Harmful
DEAR MAYO CLINIC: Why does my doctor want to know what supplements I’m taking, even if I don’t have any health problems and don’t take more than the recommended amounts? ANSWER: It’s important to tell your healthcare provider about any dietary supplements you take. Although you don’t need a prescription for most supplements, that doesn’t […]
Dietary supplements can be hard to swallow
A study in The New England Journal of Medicine casts light on a little-known hazard associated with America’s multibillion-dollar dietary supplement habit: difficulty swallowing among older people who take vitamin and mineral supplements — particularly calcium supplements. Using a decade of records from 63 hospitals, researchers with the CDC and FDA estimated that 23,000 Americans […]
