Dietary supplements lead to 23,000 ER visits annually, study finds

Adverse effects from dietary supplements account for 23,000 emergency room visits per year, a new study by federal government officials found.

Experts with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) led the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday, that looked at data from 63 emergency departments from 2004 to 2013.

{mosads}The data showed that the ER visits, which resulted in an estimated 2,154 hospitalizations a year, frequently involved young adults between the ages of 20 and 34 and unsupervised children.

After children were excluded, 65.9 percent of ER visits for single-supplement–related adverse events involved herbal or complementary nutritional products taken to lose weight or increase energy. The study found that young adults most commonly suffered from cardiovascular problems like palpitations or chest pain.

But one of the largest associations representing dietary supplement manufacturers is challenging the methodology used to produce the study’s findings.

Natural Products Association (NPA) said the study relied on data from 63 ERs instead of the official FDA Serious Adverse Event Reporting database for dietary supplements. 

“The laws that regulate supplements require official reporting of adverse events so that the regulators, the health care community and others can review the data and make informed public policy decisions,” Dan Fabricant, the NPA’s executive director and CEO, said in a news release Thursday. “This so-called study excludes that very data, which is more than puzzling because it was written in part by FDA officials who know this.”

Even if the study estimates are accurate, the NPA said the number of hospital visits suggested to relate to dietary supplements would represent .0001687 percent of the 136.3 million hospital visits each year, according to CDC data.