Like I said, nice idea
OK. I wrote about this website a few days ago and they didn’t like what I said because they thought I crossed the line between business and consumer (as well as making some errors). So, this time, I’m going to review the site from a consumer point of view only. All of the information I am about to present you with is in the public domain – either on the website concerned or by following links from it – and what I say about it is my opinion as a user of the type of products featured.
The premise of supplementscompared.com is that they help the health conscious consumer to make an informed choice between all the myriad varieties of nutritional supplements that are on the market. According to the site, there are approximately 24,000 such products available; what they intend is that their site will review them all and compare them against benchmarks that their panel of experts has come up with. This panel, which includes some respectable names from various areas of health, is chaired by singer, radio personality and lifestyle author Janey Lee Grace.
So far, so good. It’s an attractive website and presents the information in a way that’s easy to find; products are broken down into various categories and then the products in each category are compared to the benchmark and an opinion given. This is where the site starts to go awry for me. As a comparison site (supplementscompared.com), I would expect to see common information for each product; for instance, as they are giving a value rating, I’d expect to see the price. As these are health products, I’d expect to see a full ingredient list (not just the actives, but all the inactive ones as well) along with allergen statements (wheat free, lactose free, etc). An indication of whether the product is suitable for vegetarians, vegans or anyone on special diets would be good, too. Finally, how many tablets or capsules are recommended each day?
Given all that information about each product, I would be able to discount those ones that I don’t think are good value, or ones that I can’t take because I have food intolerances, or ones that are animal-derived, if I follow an ethical diet. By having standard information about each product and presenting it in a standard fashion you would help make the comparison of products easier. The site isn’t trying to make the choice for you, after all, but to give you enough good information on which to base a decision.
I’ve been taking a look at the products in the Glucosamine category. There are 11 listed, from suppliers like Tesco, Superdrug, Healthspan and Asda. Not necessarily brands that the discerning health product shopper would choose, but it’s early days. Hopefully, their ‘fast track’ review process will bring more suppliers online quickly. Of the 11, seven are listed as “Best Product” and an eighth is listed as “Worth A Look”. So right here I’m confused; those seven “Best Products” have varying “Overall Ratings” and varying “Value for Money” ratings – meaning they can’t all be the same, so how can they all be “Best Product”? I would have thought that within each category, there could only be one “Best Product”?
But perhaps all these “Best Products” are the same? Taking a closer look at two that do have the same ratings shows a number of differences: one uses the hydrochloride form of glucosamine, one uses the sulphate form. One supplies 100% of the glucosamine RDA, the other 133%. [Interesting side note here: RDA's (Recommended Daily Allowance) are set by Government for various vitamins and minerals. There is not an official RDA for glucosamine, so I assume what they're saying is this is what their experts recommend - but by using the term RDA I think they are being misleading]. There is no indication of price, no list of ingredients other than the glucosamine sulphate / hydrochloride content, no explanation of what the difference is between sulphate and hydrochloride, no indication of how much actual glucosamine is provided. So how do I choose? As a health conscious consumer, perhaps I’ve heard somewhere that one form of glucosamine contains more active glucosamine than another. But which one? I might have also heard that one form of glucosamine is suitable for vegans, because it doesn’t come from shellfish. But which? And is the one that gives more glucosamine? I don’t know and supplementscompared.com doesn’t tell me. So I’m no further forward with trying to make a choice.
There are also errors in the information shown; the Asda product is described in the text as being 750mg of glucosamine sulphate, when the ingredient list shows it as 750mg glucosamine sulphate 2KCl – which is not the same thing (glucosamine comes from glucosamine sulphate which comes from glucosamine sulphate 2KCl). You can probably put that down to poor proof-reading, though. At least I hope you can. I would hate to think that the panel of experts are making basic mistakes like that.
There are other inconsistencies, too. The Tesco product (which is low strength) has a “Value for Money” rating of 4 (out of 5), yet in the descriptive text is said to be “quite expensive”. Surely, then, it doesn’t rate a top 20% rating for value? There are products in the category which have value ratings of one or two, yet seem to be stronger products so wouldn’t that make them better value? But they don’t tell me what the prices are so I can’t judge it for myself. There are links to the suppliers sites, so I can go and look them up myself – but if I have to do that anyway, why would I bother to use supplementscompared.com?
The site has already been criticised by the National Association of Health Stores for launching with products that are so biased towards supermarkets and Channel Island-based mail-order operators; they feel that the site should be encouraging people to go into their local independent health store, where they should be able to get a more personalised service and helpful advice. To be fair to supplementscompared.com, they have not said that this is their aim and they do give a summary of the different places that supplements can bought and the varying levels of service that might be available from each. In addition they do have a list of what they describe as independent shops (even though some are internet-based).
I think they’ve bitten off more than they can chew, really. If they are actually going to review all 24,000 products it will take years – by which time the market for supplements may have changed beyond recognition. Offering their ‘fast track’ review service to suppliers that are willing to pay to have their products listed doesn’t seem in keeping with their public stance of being an independent review site. Nowhere is it suggested that the payment of a fee will produce a certain type of review, but by inviting suppliers to ‘fast track’ then it seems reasonable to assume that only the suppliers that can afford it will be on the site for the foreseeable future.
And I’m sure that it’s purely coincidence that one of the “Best Products” in the Joint Health category is produced by a company that shares the same PR company as supplementscompared.com, and who’s “leading nutritional expert” is the same man who “devised and established” supplementscompared.com. As Bill Hicks once said: “There is no connection.. and you’d be a fool and a communist to make one.”
My “Overall Rating” for supplementscompared.com? Two out of five; a good start but a number of problem areas that need to be addressed, along with a general tightening up on things.
Bipolar anyone?
I wrote a series of posts a little while ago that touched on the subjects of depression and suicide. They didn’t make for particularly uplifting reading, but they seemed to touch a nerve with a number of people and I got a number of comments about them.
I mention them again because one of the comments indicated that, while I was reluctant to call what I felt “depression”, it actually was. I was unsure at the time whether I agreed with that and let the comment pass without replying to it. I’m re-thinking that position now because of the way that I’ve been feeling over the last couple of days.
It’s not easy for me to talk about or describe my feelings. There are several reasons for this; chief amongst them are the fact that I’m fairly emotionally closed off and (to make it worse) my writing skills let me down; I get part of the idea across and then I lose my thread. I never was a good communicator.
I’m also generally reluctant to stand up and say that I have a particular health problem. Part of me sees it as weakness, part of me sees it as whinging or being histrionic (“It’s just a cold; you’re not dying”) and part of me just doesn’t believe it. I’m also acutely aware of what I think people that know me will say (“Don’t be such a twat” and things of that ilk, usually).
But having so recently been writing about and examining being on the downswing, I’ve become aware of my emotional state more than ever before in my life. Which is why over the last couple of days I’ve noticed that I’ve been feeling really, really hyper – definitely on the upswing. I’m not sure if anyone else around me has noticed it, but I’ve been generally in a much better mood, with bursts of total synapse overload, which have lead to complete and utter inane wittering, the need to just move about – swinging my arms, dancing, anything – and an overall feeling of happiness.
It’s definitely a good feeling, but I’m not sure what it means.
You can’t be serious
TV Show The Bill (that one about the coppers that used to be good years ago, but which went pants when it became just another soap opera) got into hot water last week. They featured a story about a MS sufferer and in the course of the programme mentioned a drug called Plavitron.
Apparently, they’ve now been called “grossly irresponsible” because they made this drug up and have “misled” a number of people with the disease about available treatments.
I’m sorry but The Bill is not a factual programme; it is not reporting truth. It’s a drama – you know, made up – and as such has no responsibility to be at all accurate in what it portrays. While I don’t wish to mock the afflicted, some people obviously need a reality check.
The state of your health
From my BlogSpot blog: Without wanting to get too political about it, now is not a good time to get sick in the UK. Wards have been closed in hospitals across the country because of norovirus, and MRSA and other ’superbugs’ are still not under control; plus if you pick the wrong hospital to go to, you may well end up being treated by a porter masquerading as a doctor. The NHS is basically on its knees because it’s been neglected and poorly managed for too many years.
Read the rest of this entry by clicking here.
B Complex made simple(r)
Part of Wolfie’s Nutrition Guide : An occasional series
I’m not really attacking the alphabet in order, at least as far as vitamins go, so apologies for back-tracking to B after having already covered C and E. (I’ll complete the confusion in the next instalment by jumping to D!).
You’ve probably heard the term B complex vitamins, or vitamin B complex. What you may not be aware of is what this actually means, and how it relates to vitamins B1, B2, etc. The B vitamins are a family; they generally occur together naturally and they have what is known as a synergistic realtionship – the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. They tend to work together in the body, and a shortage of one often indicates a shortage of the others.
As with many nutrients, B vitamins have many roles to play in our health including:
- A healthy nervous system
- The release of energy from food
- Proper digestion
- Healthy skin, hair and nails
- Proper production of red blood cells
- Maintaining emotional balance
- Relaxing
They are all water-soluble, so are easily passed from the body – this means that a regular supply is needed to help maintain good health. Some of the B vitamins – particularly B12 (cobalamin) – are mainly found in red meat, so if you follow a vegetarian or vegan diet you should make sure you have a good alternative source. Menstruating women should ensure they have an adequate supply of B6 (pyriodoxine) as this helps to produce haemoglobin.
B vitamins are commonly available as a complex in supplements (ie all of them together) but they can also be available separately; the major ones you will see are:
- B1 – Thiamin
- B2 – Riboflavin
- B3 – Niacin
- B5 – Pantothenic Acid
- B6 – Pyridoxine
- B12 – Cobalamin
- Folic Acid – Folacin
- Biotin
- Choline
- Inositol
There is some debate as to whether those last two are B vitamins, but there is a consensus that classes them as such.So how much do I need? As always, opinion is divided on this issue. The EU things you only need a few milligrams (a spread from 1mg to 6mg) but nutritional practitioners reckon that for optimal health you should be looking for a supplement that gives you 50mg of B1 to B6, Choline and Inositol and around 100µg to 400µg for B12, Folic and Biotin. In times of particular stress (poor health, lots of physical activity) you can double those amounts.
Wolfs Helpers
