Myths And Truths About Dietary Supplements
October 27, 2008
Dietary supplements are often promoted as natural, health enhancing substances. There is a generalized public belief and understanding amongst many people who take them, that even if dietary supplements provide no additional health benefit, there would also not be any adverse effects associated with them. With the advent of state of the art research methodologies, and new scientific observations, it has become clear that dietary supplements may also have some serious adverse effects.
A very good example for this is the weight-loss dietary supplement ephedra, which was taken off the market due to serious and sometimes fatal adverse effects. Another important research observation in terms of antioxidants has been, that their large doses could have negative effects on some sensitive persons. Another impotant clinical study which was also performed on Echinacea confirmed that, the plant has no potential benefit in treating common cold and the effect is only due to placebo.
Major problems with dietary supplements
The internet and media resources are abound with a lot of hype and cry about dietary supplements, and all the wonderful things that they may do to the body. Even if you don’t go looking for it, it would not be a rarity if the dietary supplement information may find you, the means could be unsolicited e-mails and pop-up ads; television advertisements and commercials. The clarity of the resource is generally dubious and may lead to confusion and variability. There is a lot of unjust promotion of the dietary supplements by the advertising media and the scientific reports in this context is generally unauthenticated as well. It would be worthwhile to mention, that with some background information it would always be better to make the process of deciding whether to take one or more dietary supplements not only simpler but safer for your health as well.
Things you should be aware about
Differences in genetic makeup and consumption patterns (such as diet, drugs, and dietary supplements) among people may influence how dietary supplements act in the body. These differences may also determine whether a dietary supplement provides some benefit, has no positive or negative effect, or causes harm. Therefore, always take a medical supervision or counselling and remain cognizant about scientific outputs on the dietary supplement you are consuming.
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