Evidence map›Paper›PMID 26991455›Full record

ReviewBritish journal of clinical pharmacology2017

Defining 'nutraceuticals': neither nutritious nor pharmaceutical.

Jeffrey K Aronson

Open access · bronzeAbstract readReview
In one paragraph

Review in British journal of clinical pharmacology, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 89 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
89citing papers in PubMed
11.8field-weighted citation impact, top 1% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

89 citing papers in PubMed, 266 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Trial
  2. Review
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  6. Article
  7. Review
  8. Review
  9. Review
  10. Review
  11. Review
  12. Article
  13. Nutraceutical Potential of Bitter Melon (Current issues in molecular biology · 2025
    Review
  14. Article
  15. Review
  16. Review
  17. Review
  18. Article
  19. Management of menopausal hot flushes. Recommendations from the Spanish Menopause Society.European journal of obstetrics & gynecology and reproductive biology: X · 2025
    Review
  20. Article

29 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.

Jeffrey K AronsonCentre for Evidence Based Medicine, Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, Radcliffe Observatory Quarter, Oxford, OX26GG, UK.
University of Oxford · GB

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

There are widespread inconsistencies and contradictions in the many published definitions of 'nutraceuticals' and 'functional foods', demonstrating wholesale uncertainty about what they actually are. Furthermore, in a 2014 lecture, the inventor of the term 'nutraceutical', confessing that nutraceuticals do not work, said that 'the quest to demonstrate whether … long-term supplementation [with nutraceuticals] can prevent serious diseases … has come to an end'. Definitions of 'nutraceuticals' and related terms, still widely used, should therefore be explored systematically. There are no internationally agreed definitions of 'nutraceuticals' and 'functional foods', or of similar terms, such as 'health foods', or of terms related to herbal products, which are sometimes referred to as 'nutraceuticals', compounding the confusion. 'Nutraceuticals' and 'functional foods' are vague, nondiscriminatory, unhelpful terms; the evidence suggests that they should be abandoned in favour of more precise terms. The term 'dietary supplement' is widely used to designate formulations that are also called 'nutraceuticals' but it would be better restricted to individual compounds used to treat or prevent deficiencies. 'Fortified foods', sometimes called 'designer foods', are foods to which compounds of proven therapeutic or preventive efficacy (e.g. folic acid) have been added. Other terms, such as 'food', 'foodstuffs', 'eat', 'drink', and 'nutrition', are well defined, as are 'medicinal products' and 'pharmaceutical formulations'. Dietary regimens, such as Mediterranean or nitrate-rich diets or vegetarianism, can affect health. A dietary regimen of this kind can be defined as a programme of food, of a defined kind and/or quantity, prescribed or adopted for the restoration or preservation of health.

Indexed as

Food, OrganicFunctional FoodPharmaceutical PreparationsDietDietary SupplementsHumansNutritional Physiological PhenomenaPreventive MedicinePharmaceutical Preparationsdesigner foodsdietary regimensdietary supplementsfortified foodsfunctional foodsnutraceuticals

Identifiers

PMID26991455
PMCPMC5338166
OpenAlexW2299908713

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.