NIH: Nutrition Data

A lot of people are asking about nutrition and supplements to improve health and fitness. The website above is an EXCELLANT site from the National Institute of Health. In the search box on the site you can type what you want information on... "Iron", etc and they have FAQ pages set up.

Also, discussions about current research on Supplements such as Echinacea.

Check it out!

Awesome, Sherasi, thank! ...I guess sometimes the government comes through...

Sherasi, thanks for posting an authoritative and informative set of links. The public is bombarded with a bewildering maze of claims for nutritional supplements, so this kind of info is badly needed. A healthy dose of skepticism (forgive the pun) can also be found here in The Skeptic's Dictionary: Supplements: vitamins, minerals, herbs, & "natural" products, which contains numerous links to specific articles.

One more thing: patients scheduled for surgery are urged to disclose the use of all nutritional supplements with their surgeon and anesthesiologist. Some herbal substances should be discontinued up to several weeks before surgery to prevent complications.

Prof, you are totally right. It is odd, but many people don't realize that those herbs and supplements they are using are often the basis for actual medications produced by drug companies for therapeutic effect.

For example, willow bark tea is a natural remedy many people use for pain. Well, it is a natural derivative of Aspirin which can increase bleeding.

So, if they are already taking "an asprin a day" and then drinking this for pain relief, that can lead to complications that the doctor is totally unaware could happen.