Hi, this is Teri. I am a 3rd generation Alzheimer’s Survivor and a co-caregiver of a parent who is surviving and thriving despite having Alzheimer’s Disease.
Last week, we addressed the good, the bad, and the ugly in the world of supplementation. This week I planned to move on and focus on tools that can help you determine what supplements your body needs. However, comments from last Thursday’s Zoom call made it clear that we need to spend more time on the quality of supplements available for you to purchase in the big box stores, the chain pharmacies, and online.
After spending years working face-to-face with patients looking to take responsibility for and improve their health, I became concerned with why they were not getting the results they wanted from many brands. This led me to research the supplement lifecycle and who regulates and tests supplements.
One of my primary concerns with supplementation is Trust. Can we trust the ingredients in the supplements we buy? The quick answer is NO. I do not trust 99% of the brands that manufacture supplements. Why?
Year after year Consumer Reports and other Consumer Watchdogs purchase supplements from the shelves of, WalMart, Sam’s, Costco, Walgreens, & online. They hide the brand names and ship supplement samples to independent labs. Every year, those reports come back from the lab showing little to no active ingredients in the bottle. This tells me that we are wasting our time and money on most of the supplement brands that are available for purchase. Why?
There is NO government agency to test and regulate supplements sold in the US. Supplement manufacturers can put anything in a bottle, call it the cure for cancer, and sell it. As long as they label it as a “dietary supplement” – it is legal.
Most supplement manufacturers are more focused on sales and marketing than they are on ensuring that the ingredients maintain their efficacy. That is why they spend their money on celebrity endorsements, flashy, colorful bottles, and premium product placement. Most consumer buying decisions take place when you stand in the aisle at the store. Making it important that something catches your eye and encourages you to make the purchase.
Most of the nutritional ingredients in the supplements purchased at Sam’s, Walmart, Target, Costco, Walgreens, CVS & at the grocery store are 3 – 4 years old before you purchase them. What was once a perfect nutrient has lost its effectiveness by the time it enters your body. The problem is found in the manufacturing and distribution lifecycle.
The typical lifecycle of your standard commercial supplement looks like this:
1. HARVEST
The raw vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients are harvested from all over the world.
2. TRANSPORT & CONSOLIDATION
Most of the ingredients are shipped to China where Chinese wholesalers warehouse the raw materials until they find a buyer. It is common for fillers and binders to be added to extend the volume of the raw products. This step alone can take 2 – 3 years.
3. WHOLESALE
Once a buyer is identified and the sale takes place, the raw ingredients are transported within China to either another wholesaler or distributor. This process of shuffling raw materials can take place multiple times adding more time, additional expense, and more questionable fillers, enhancers, and binders to the raw product. Once again extending the volume of the raw materials.
4. MANUFACTURING
Eventually, the raw materials find their way to a manufacturer within China. The manufacturer will combine the raw ingredients into a powder, granule, cake, or residue where the product will then again be stored and possibly shipped to another manufacturer who specializes in encapsulating the ingredients or compressing the ingredients into a tablet. It is usually in the manufacturing process that the product is tested for quality.
5. PACKAGING
Primary Packaging: The product is placed in containers such as bottles, blister packs, or pouches.
Secondary Packaging: The primary containers are boxed and labeled for retail, with information like the product name, ingredients, dosage, and expiration date.
6. WAREHOUSING
Finished packaged goods are stored in warehouses before being shipped to the US.
7. SHIPPING
Finished packaged goods are placed in containers and loaded onto HUGE container ships. It is impossible to control the product temperature during the shipping process. This process will take at least 2 – 6 weeks.
8. WAREHOUSING & DISTRIBUTION
At this point, the final packaged product usually enters the distribution cycle of its final reseller. Wal-Mart, Target CVS, Walgreens, Costco & Sam’s will move the inventory to regional distribution centers.
9. RETAIL
The individual stores will order products as needed. Once the individual stores receive the product, it will be placed on the shelf. Retailers display and sell the product to consumers. Some retailers may offer promotional deals or discounts to move inventory.
10. PURCHASE
Finally, after years and years, you purchase the supplement and take it home.
11. END-USE
For the first week, you take the supplement and anticipate healthy changes in your body. However, after a few weeks, you don’t experience an earth-shattering difference and you slowly forget to take the supplement. Slowly the bottle gets pushed back in the cabinet until it is forgotten forever.
Someone on the Zoom call last week asked how can I be so sure that most supplements experience this lifecycle. There are a few resources that I use to track this data. The first is a simple Google search. Simply search for consumer watchdog reports on supplements. You will see the results from the reports that come out year after year.
The second resource is a company called Importyeti. ImportYeti tracks the bills of lading, the declared products shipped, all of the suppliers, the weight of the products, the number of containers shipped, and the cost of the shipping. I can track where the container was loaded on the ship, if it was climate-controlled or not, the path the ship took to get to the US, how long it took, and where it was unloaded.
My favorite supplement manufacturer, Metagenics, is happy to provide the lab results of each batch of supplements they sell. Go to the quality tab on their website, enter the lot number from the bottle you purchased and you will have the lab results from that product. Here is the link: https://www.metagenics.com/quality
Next week, we will go back and talk about the tools you can use to determine what supplements your body needs to achieve better health.