1) Look for intervention clinical studies (those involving giving the
supplement to real people).
Studies in test tubes, cell culture dishes,
and in animals don't always predict what will happen in people.
Epidemiologic
or population studies (those that compare what different
population groups eat, for example) are good for proposing hypotheses,
but
until they are tested in a clinical trial, they are not considered as proof
of effectiveness.
As for the clinical studies, if the study is measuring
the delivery of a nutrient to the bloodstream, it does not
need to be
double blind or placebo-controlled. On the other hand, if the study is
measuring a health outcome (for
example, lower cholesterol or decreased
pain) it should be both placebo controlled and double blind
2) Look
for studies that have been published in peer-reviewed medical
journals. If a company tells "that their scientists
have shown ...", you have
no way of evaluating the quality of their data unless it has been
peer-reviewed and published
in a credible journal. You also need to know
that there are advertising journals as well as credible scientific
journals.
An advertising journal will accept any article for a price and
there is no peer review to evaluate the quality of the data.
If in doubt
as to whether a journal is credible, check it out on PubMed, the National
Library of Medicine web site.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=PubMedFinally, the same is true for studies reported in the newspaper, in
magazines, and in books,
even in those written by popular authors. Many of
those articles can best be characterized as "nutrition fiction"
and have
not been peer-reviewed by scientists in the field.
3) The studies should be done with the company's
actual product in the
population group it is designed for. Many companies will say that "their
product contains
ingredient "X" that has been shown to". In fact, that
doesn't guarantee that the original studies were valid or that
the
ingredient will have that effect in their product.
Companies will also quote studies that were done on other company's products. Because America's
#! Natural Health Company does more studies than anyone else, many nutrition companies quote their clinical studies in
support of their products. Of course, their products were formulated differently than America's #1 Natural Health Company's and
they don't have the quality controls, so there is no guarantee that their product will perform as well as this product.
4)
Look for a large number of clinical studies on a variety of different products. Some companies have only one or two
credible products and all of their clinical studies are focused on that product. They'd like you to think their other
products are just as good, but in fact many are not backed by any credible research.
5) Make sure that they are
not being selective in the studies they tell you about. For example, one major manufacturer of garlic touts two clinical
studies which show that their product lowers cholesterol, but neglects to tell you about two other studies which showed that
their product had no effect on cholesterol levels.
If they tell you that such studies are impractical, too expensive,
or unnecessary, don't believe them. America's #1 Natural Health Company has shown that if a company is
committed
to making the best products possible, such studies are essential.
America's #1 Natural Health Company has conducted over 80 clinical studies on a wide variety
of their products. Those studies are all published in peer-reviewed medical journals.
Sincerely,
Steve Chaney,
Ph.D.
