Dietary Supplements in Sports

One of the studies in our March 2016 CJSM which has generated substantial interest is original research from the Department of Military and Emergency Medicine, Uniformed Services University of the USA: “Dietary Supplements: Knowledge and Adverse Event Reporting among American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM) Physicians.”

The AMSSM, one of our affiliated societies, is having its annual meeting coming up in Dallas April 15 – 20, and we’re looking forward to joining in those proceedings [the official hashtag of the meeting is #AMSSM16 — keep that in mind you Twitter folks].  The physician membership is not infrequently surveyed about a variety of matters of interest to practicing sports medicine clinicians; the results of these surveys often provide invaluable data to researchers who have published in the CJSM pages.

Examples of this include “Concussion Practice Management Patterns among Sports Medicine Physicians” and “Cardiovascular Preparticipation Screening Practices of College Team Physicians.” 

Regarding the study on dietary supplements (DS), the authors looked at a variety of issues.  Of note, they found that majority of survey respondents (71%) reported that athletes under their care had experienced an adverse event associated DS use.

Not all of us who read this blog or subscribe to the journal are AMSSM members, of course, and so I thought it might be time for a poll, asking this very question: have you ever taken care of an athlete who has experienced an adverse DS event?  Please, take the poll, and if you can, send us a comment on this blog identifying the DS, the adverse outcome, and possibly the sport in which your athlete was participating.

We hope to see you in Dallas!