Unit 4 AssignmentBy: Keagan Nelson

HW499-01 Professor: Earon DavisFebruary 26, 2017

How to Find Health and Wellness Information

• The NIH National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) is a great start for information regarding vitamins, herbs, and supplements. This website offers a wide variety of resources including research and study findings, blogs, news, contact information, and organization training, events, and more. (NIH, 2017). Another resources which I personally use as a reliable resource is The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. This journal is easily accessible and it contains many peer reviewed articles related to nutritional supplementation. My favorite feature of the journal’s website is the search bar which looks up the key words typed in and refers you to scholarly articles accordingly. (AJCN. 2017). One other website which is another great resource for nutritional supplementation information is the Office for Dietary Supplements (ODS). This website contains many types of information and resources regarding supplement facts including health information, news and events, FAQ’s, contact resources, and so on. (ODS. 2017).

Additional Educational Resources

• In addition to the previously mentioned websites, journals, and so on, the following resources are helpful in educating individuals of nutritional supplementation information. For information regarding the safe and smart use of supplements, helpguide.org readily provides insight regarding cautions and dangers of supplementation use, tips and advice for safe supplement use, newsletters and articles pertaining to the safety of supplements, and more. (Help Guide. 2017). I also believe that reading through forums, blogs, and product reviews can be useful to the average person. This is a simple way to find out information regarding other individual’s success or failure with products. Also, one could gain some ideas or alternative methods to nutritional intake and supplementation from these types of resources.

Recommendations• The recommendations I would give to an individual just beginning their journey

of nutrition and nutritional supplementation is to first and foremost, start slow. I believe one should positively identify the issues they would like to address and then significantly research all possible options to fixing that issue. Reviews and forums would be a good idea as well, as researching what you are putting into your body can never hurt. The one thing I worry of is over-use of supplements because people think that too much or the wrong mixture cannot have negative consequences. This is wrong though, always start cautiously, and cross-check the supplements you may be thinking of taking together to ensure safety. (ODS, 2017). Use resources that are available to you and of course, always consult a professional before making any big decisions.

Precautions• The precautions of supplement use lay in a few places in my opinion.

The FDA does not test supplements because they make no claims of healing or curing disease, therefore there are more likely than not faulty supplements out there. (Help Guide. 2017). There is possibility of there even being dangerous supplements out on store shelves. Mixing prescriptions with supplements and/or taking too high of doses of either can also be harmful. (ODS. 2017). Since every individual is different what may work for one individual may not work for another individual even in similar health status range. These precautions all emphasize the importance of research and caution when using nutritional supplements.

References• AJCN. (2017). Home. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Retrieved from:

https://nccih.nih.gov/

• Help Guide. (2017). Dietary Supplements. Helpguide.org. Retrieved from: https://www.helpguide.org/articles/healthy-eating/dietary-supplements.htm

• NIH. (2017). Health. National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health. Retrieved from: https://nccih.nih.gov/

• ODS. (2017). Health Information. National Institutes of Health. Office of Dietary Supplements. Retrieved from: https://ods.od.nih.gov/