• FDA Regulation
  
  The nutritional supplement industry has been poorly regulated since 1994, when Congress passed the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA). As a result of this act, the ingredients used in nutritional supplements are no longer subject to safety evaluation before they are put on the market. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) can seek to prove that a supplement is hazardous only after it is already on the market, being sold to the U.S. public. As a result, the supplement industry has become a virtually unregulated "free-for-all." Thousands of uninspected and unreviewed nutritional supplements are sold over the Internet, in drugstores, through mail order, even via radio and television. Looking to introduce some legitimacy to this market, the FDA recently announced its intention to enforce regulations regarding the production, packaging, and accurate labeling of nutritional supplements. But this will take time, and until these regulations are enforced, there are specific areas of concern that each nutritional supplement user should consider, including whether or not the supplement actually improves the health of the consumer, the safety of the supplement, the accurate labeling of the supplement, and the possible interactions that the supplement may have with medications, treatments, or even other nutritional supplement ingredients
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• Effectiveness
  
  Although the FDA generally prohibits supplement producers from making specific health claims for their products, nevertheless the industry has succeeded in misleading consumers about the benefits of many widely sold supplements, suggesting that a certain ingredient has a certain result on a certain condition or disease without any scientific evidence. That has tarnished the image of all nutritional supplements. Even so, there are some nutritional supplement ingredients that have been studied in well-designed clinical trials, which appear to offer real benefits to people with specific health problems or to patients who are at high risk for certain diseases. For example, coenzyme Q10 has shown benefit for those in the early stages of Parkinson's, saw palmetto has been shown to alleviate certain symptoms associated with enlarged prostate, and a number of nutrients have been shown to potentially decrease the risk of developing prostate, breast, and colon cancer. Your choice of a meaningful and effective nutritional supplement, like your decision to take certain prescription medicines, requires careful selection.
  
  
• Safety
  
  Over the past several years, a number of nutritional supplements such as kava, ephedrine, Lipokinex, and PC-SPES have been found to be either adulterated or unsafe. Often these problems were discovered only after widespread use was already underway. Furthermore, just because a product is derived from "natural" or "herbal" sources does not assure safety. Since no safety testing of nutritional supplements is required by the FDA, you need to look for other assurances of a product’s safety. Formulas and ingredients should be overseen by credentialed experts. Involvement and oversight from your health care provider becomes even more important.
  
  
• Accuracy and Purity
  
  Prescription medications are produced under a rigid set of FDA guidelines known as "drug GMPs” (good manufacturing practices). Pharmaceutical production facilities are subject to careful inspection, assuring that proper steps are taken in formulation of the product, adequate quality control is in place, and batch testing is performed to certify that each "10 Milligram" pill of a prescription medication actually contains 10 milligrams of active ingredient. Unfortunately, no such oversight of nutritional supplement production exists. The FDA considers nutritional supplements to be "food," and so, regulates the production process in the same way as it would the manufacture of products such as potato chips, ketchup or breakfast cereal. So, while manufacturers are inspected for plant cleanliness, they are not held responsible for product quality. As a result, recently published studies using third party analysis have revealed wide variation in the content and purity of nutritional supplements. You should look for independent certification that the supplements you take are manufactured under GMPs and are verified to contain what they claim to contain, in the quantity that is represented.
  
  
• Medication Interactions
  
  The health care provider who helps you carefully select your nutritional supplement can also help you monitor its use. Over the past years, a number of nutritional supplements have caused unwanted side-effects and have been found to be unsafe; even a product derived from "natural" or "herbal" sources can be unsafe. Your health care provider can help monitor for side-effects, and also watch for negative interactions: between nutritional supplement ingredients, medications, and other treatments. For example, high doses of vitamin E and gingko biloba can increase the effect of blood-thinning medications well beyond the desired result. Finally, your health care provider can monitor dosage and its effects. He or she will be sensitive to dosage-related issues, looking for complications that would result if a supplement contained more of an ingredient than listed on the label, or noting a supplement's failure to provide the promised benefits, perhaps because the supplement contains less of an ingredient than listed on the label.

The Physician Select Vitamins Solution
Physician Select Vitamins was established to address the problems presented above.

• Physician Select Vitamins are created based on credible scientific evidence, formulated with the advice of a medical advisory board of practicing physicians representing various specialties.
  
  
• Physician Select Vitamins formulas and ingredients are constantly being reevaluated in light of the latest research trials.
  
  
• Physician Select Vitamins are manufactured at an FDA approved manufacturing facility located in California and are made with premium quality ingredients.
  
  
• Physician Select Vitamins are not mass-marketed, and are intended to be used under the supervision of a health care provider, as one component of a comprehensive health maintenance program