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Healthy Solutions
So, you think your supplement brand is doing the job? What if I told you that your brand probably contains toxic contaminants which negate the very benefits that you believed would help you?
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For instance, you take supplements to rid your body of inflammation, but too many supplement brands contain harmful ingredients that create the very inflammation you are trying to expel from your body. Too many brands contain unsafe levels of heavy metals, they fail potency testing, their products are adulterated, the dose is inaccurately stated, or not all the ingredients are listed due to a loophole in reporting requirements. Studies have found:
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46% of Creatine gummies fail label claim.
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26 of 33 Berberine products on Amazon and Walmart.com don’t contain labeled amount of berberine.
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14 of 21 Astaxanthin products on Amazon contain lower than labeled amount.
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15 of 20 Bromelain supplements fail potency.
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Toxic elements are found in prenatal vitamins with lead at unacceptable levels in more than half of the products tested.
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Arsenic is also found in some products at unsafe levels.
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160 products were tested from 70 top-selling supplement brands. Nearly half of the protein powders tested had unsafe levels of heavy metals.
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7 of 8 CoQ10 supplements fail potency testing
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Prevalence of adulteration in dietary sport supplement products.
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Supplement products tested positive for anabolic agents or other prohibited substances.
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Supplement facts labels do not reflect the actual contents of the product.
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Amounts of caffeine actually present ranged from 59% to 176% of packaging claims.
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Misrepresenting ingredient contents on their labels.
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Adulteration of dietary supplements.
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Wide variety of undeclared active pharmaceutical ingredients.
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Some supplement labels inaccurately describe the dose of the supplement.
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Discrepancies between what’s on the label and what’s in the bottle.
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Some products contained more than 1 unapproved FDA ingredient.​​
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634 nutritional supplements that were purchased in 13 different countries showed that about 15% of the nonhormonal nutritional supplements were contaminated with anabolic-androgenic steroids (mainly prohormones).
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160 protein powder products were tested from the top 70 brands representing about 38% of the protein powder market. They were tested for a range of 258 different potential contaminants, including arsenic, mercury, and bisphenols. Of the products tested, 47% had higher levels of heavy metals than recommended under California Proposition 65 safety thresholds—with 21% of those testing more than twice over the Prop 65 threshold for lead.​​​
I rely on the sources below to help me determine if it is worthy of being put into my body or not.
ConsumerLab (paid Subscription)
ConsumerLab.com, LLC ("CL") is the leading provider of independent test results and information to help consumers and healthcare professionals identify the best quality health and nutrition products. It publishes results of its tests in comprehensive Product Review reports at www.consumerlab.com for its members. CL also conducts an annual Survey of Vitamin & Supplement Users.
Examine (paid Subscription)
Examine is the largest database of nutrition and supplement research on the internet. We have more than 30 researchers on our team, with half working full time for Examine. Founded in early 2011, Examine’s mission is to analyze the full body of evidence to help you be healthier. As an educational organization, we are not affiliated with any supplement or food company, and our research team is contractually obligated to have no conflicts of interest.
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Clean Label Project - Certified Projects (free)
Clean Label Project is on a mission to reveal what labels don’t show, empowering you to feel more confident in the products you use daily. While traditional food safety standards can be limited to microbial and pathogen contaminants risks, we go further, spotlighting hidden threats like heavy metals, pesticides, and plasticizers.
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Dietary Supplement Label Database (DSLD) (free)
The Dietary Supplement Label Database (DSLD) was developed by the Office of Dietary Supplements (ODS) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). It catalogs all information printed on labels of dietary supplement products sold in the United States. The database resulted from specific recommendations to NIH from Congress in 2004 that encouraged the Office to develop, create, regularly update, maintain, and make available to government and research entities a database of all supplement labels sold in the United States.
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HerbPathy (free)
The ultimate collection of medicinal plants, which are useful in different diseases and conditions. We have a collection of more than 400 diseases and conditions stating their causes and symptoms. In the Herbs section, there are over 1700 herbs identified with their medicinal uses. In the Chemical Constituents section, there are over 1800 chemical constituents and nutrients in order to identify which nutrient is present in which herb.
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LabDoor (free)
We buy products through major retail stores and online sites, just like the everyday consumer. Labdoor does not accept samples from manufacturers for grading or ranking purposes. Analytical chemistry assays are performed on samples of each product at an FDA-registered lab. Default analyses include measurements of active ingredients and potential contaminants. We calculate a Quality score using laboratory results and label claims from each product. Quality scores are comprised of individual scores for Label Accuracy, Product Purity, Nutritional Value, Ingredient Safety, and Projected Efficacy. Products are ranked by overall Quality and by Value through a paired matching of Quality scores and price. We publish detailed reports to summarize exactly what we found in our analyses and make this information and our rankings available to you for free.