While the use of dietary supplements appears to be very common among patients who also take prescription medications, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh found that most potential drug-dietary supplement interactions were not serious. Results of their findings are in today’s Archives of Internal Medicine. Dietary supplements have been gaining widespread popularity to treat a myriad of health conditions and physical complaints. However, the extent of this use along with prescription medications is widely unknown or underreported by primary care physicians. The Pitt researchers sought to explore both the incidence and severity of potential interactions between prescription medications and dietary supplements and found that most of the interactions – approximately 94 percent of the patient population studied – were not serious, based on limited available evidence.
