Dietary Supplement Safety Information in Magazines Popular among Older Readers

Abstract

Dietary supplements are extensively used in the United States, especially by people age 50 and over. Surveys have shown that magazines and other news media are an important source of information about nutrition and dietary supplements for the American public. It is uncertain, however, whether magazines provide their readers with adequate information about the safety aspects of supplement use. This report presents an analysis of supplement safety information in articles published during 1994-1998 in 10 major magazines popular among older readers. This time period was chosen to allow the impact of the 1994 Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) to be assessed. The evaluation included 254 magazine articles. More than two-thirds of the articles did not include comprehensive information about the safety aspects of the dietary supplements that were discussed. Information about safety issues such as maximum safe doses and drug-supplement interactions was often lacking even in otherwise informative and well-researched articles. A total of 2,983 advertisements for more than 130 different types of supplements were published in the magazines surveyed. The number of advertisements per year increased between 1995 and 1998. Supplements of particular interest to older adults (such as antioxidants, calcium, garlic, ginkgo biloba, joint health products, liquid oral supplements, and multivitamins) were among the most frequently advertised products. Although magazines popular among older readers contain extensive information about dietary supplements, these publications cannot be relied upon to provide readers with all of the information that they need in order to use supplements safely.

Use of Herbal Medicine and Other Dietary Supplements in Community‐Dwelling Older People: Baseline Data from the Ginkgo Evaluation of Memory Study

“…The literature has consistently identified several demographic factors associated with the use of vitamins and minerals, including sex, age, race, education, and income 9,28–47 . Specific positive health behaviors were also associated with vitamin and mineral use: having a healthy BMI or weight, not smoking, moderate or no use of alcohol, and regular physical activity 9,30,31,33,36,37,40–44 .…”

A Decade of Research on Health Content in the Media: The Focus on Health Challenges and Sociocultural Context and Attendant Informational and Ideological Problems

“…Likewise, research focused on age-related issues and analyzed media targeted to specific age groups including prime-time television for children aged 2-11 (Byrd-Bredbenner et al, 2003), teen media (DuRant et al, 1997;Malone et al, 2002;Smith, 2005;Stern, 2005), and, aside from depictions of menopause, magazines popular among older readers (Kava, et al, 2002). 4 Sociocultural groups also were acknowledged by addressing health concerns biophysically associated with one group.…”

“…At the same time, media messages about diet and nutrition emphasize personal management of weight or the ''watch what you eat'' mentality (cf., Lawrence, 2004;Rothblum, 1999) but give little advice on how to do this in healthful ways: food advertisements do not conform to dietary recommendations (Byrd-Bredbenner & Grasso, 1999), dietary supplement advertisements do not attend to safety issues (Kava et al, 2002), and alcohol advertisements outweigh healthful food product advertisements in African American women's magazines . While Pratt and colleagues (1996) reported a decrease in diet pill advertising and increases in advertisements related to more healthful methods of weight management, in this study the determination of ''healthful'' was based on advertising claims (e.g., low calorie, light, low salt, etc.)…”

Webjornalismo em saúde: práticas e criação de espaço online para a promoção da saúde

“…É inegável a contribuição que conglomerados de comunicação podem dar para a saúde publica e coletiva, ao, por exemplo, colocarem em pauta temas sobre saúde e informar a população sobre os cuidados preventivos. [16][17][18][19][20][21] Rádio, TV e jornal impresso conseguem, através de estratégias de texto e abordagens e abrangências, traduzir as informações e preocupações dos setores públicos, de epidemiologistas e outros profissionais para a população no geral e conseguem assim, responder também as principais dúvidas da população em geral.…”