Since 1994 with the incorporation of the Dietary Supplement Health Education Act (DSHEA) dietary supplements, including herbal manufacturers became responsible to police themselves.  

All things considered (purity, potency, adverse events, etc., in relation to sales volumes), they have done a fairly good job. And they certainly have a better track record than the FDA-regulated drug industry. This is not to put down the FDA. It is simply overworked and drugs have far more serious side effects than most herbals. But most herbals are generally not as effective as their drug counterpart.

Here's our statement on how to gain confidence in the manufacturing and proper use of dietary supplements and our position on the use of herbals/supplements as medicines.

How does the consumer protect themselves and Gain Confidence in the Benefits of Dietary Supplements?

First and foremost, educate yourself. If you choose to incorporate some sort of dietary supplementation into your life, do not buy based on advertising, price or friendly advises. The following points are what consumers should expect and demand before choosing a brand of supplements:

• At this time in the U.S. only use dietary supplements for non-medicinal purposes (unless proven remedy) such as health improvement and maintenance, hastening fitness goals or to safely enhance athletic performance - match claims or uses only to these goals.
• The product manufacturer should have Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs) in place for quality assurance so the products cannot vary from batch to batch. Manufactures that follow GMPs generally make pharmaceuticals, which means they operate under a drug license and therefore have the ability to test every substance from the raw materials to the finished products for purity, potency and reproducibility.
• Tests include disintegration, dissolution, stability, purity (no contaminants) and potency, which includes the finished products certificate of analysis (C of A).
• In-house product validation and testing methods based on all available certified protocols including applicable methods found in The United States Pharmacopoeia (USP) and other international compendias.
• Proof of "equivalence." That is, a given dose of a product must contain a certain amount of key ingredients in order to produce a known effect.
• The manufacturer or supplier should have the appropriate peer-review research that supports the dosage and purpose of the compound.
• Proof that products actually will be absorbed and utilized by the body.
• Disintegration and dissolution tests.
• Assurance that the substance is nontoxic, along with list of any known potential side effects and interactions with drugs.
• Product incorporation into a program that maintains the user's nutrient intake in safe optimal range by considering food, drug, and other supplement intake by using an appropriate screening process.
• Distributor or the manufacturer should have qualified personnel and support documents made available to all consumers.

The aforementioned process can be performed with a five-minute phone call or visit to a Web site. Following your investigation, you can request the supporting documents and review them. If the documents sufficiently meet the stated criteria you have found your family's dietary supplement supplier and information center. Once you get comfortable with a brand you have investigated, stay with it!

Dietary Supplements as Medicines

No one argues that there may be significant advantages to treating some diseases with natural substances as opposed to using their drug counterpart and that the medical community is on the brink of adding a few of these alternatives to traditional medicine. But because of the complexities of the human organism during a pathological state and the uncertainty of the potential beneficial active ingredient(s) in most natural compounds, it becomes very difficult for the average consumer to self diagnose and then select a potential remedy.

Although supplements are generally meant to enhance naturally occurring bodily functions without disturbing natural physiology-thus providing health care, some natural substances have drug actions. Drugs treat symptoms and often necessarily and dramatically disturb normal functioning-thus generally providing disease care. Therefore dietary supplements that act like drugs are drugs (whether it is because of dosage or structure) and should be treated as such.

At this time it is the position of Apex Fitness Group that the general population does not use dietary supplements including herbal remedies for medicinal purposes (one notable exception may be glucosamine and chondroitin for osteoarthritis) unless recommended by a qualified health professional. This practitioner would have experience in treating disease and symptoms with both drugs and natural compounds and performed the proper homework in order for them to choose the safest and most effective therapy.