Abstract
Over the past decade, untested dietary supplements have become more available on the market with a vast increase in their use by amateur and elite athletes to improve their professional sport performances. These supplements are often advertised online and elsewhere with misleading marketing strategies as “natural” and “safe” compounds. They include a wide range of products, such as sports foods (e.g., gels, bars, drinks, protein powders); ergogenic, herbal and botanical supplements; vitamins; minerals; amino acids; and weight-loss substances, among others, and are sometimes sold without any previous demonstration of their safety and efficacy, making this a highly profitable and loosely regulated marketplace. In this chapter we explore how this phenomenon poses unprecedented challenges to the anti-doping community and its values. It argues how one of such challenges stems from athletes reportedly testing positive for doping due to the intake of products, which were poorly labelled or contaminated with prohibited compounds. It explains how. . the scenario is further complicated by the rise of online markets, fora and social media communities, where athletes have found rapid and “safe” virtual spaces to exchange information on how to boost their performances by using drugs. A comprehensive overview of motivations of use, patterns of consumption, perceived risks and perceived side effects of untested supplement intake without clinical supervision is also discussed.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Catalani V, Negri A, Townshend H, Simonato P, Prilutskaya M, Tippett A, Corazza O. (2021) The market of sport supplements in the digital era: A netnographic analysis of perceived risks, side-effects and other safety issues. Emerging Trends in Drugs, Addictions and Health 1, 100014. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.etdah.2021.100014
Mazzoni I, Barroso O, Rabin O, 2017. Anti-doping challenges with novel psychoactive substances in sport, in: Novel Psychoactive Substances: Policy, Economics and Drug Regulation. Springer International Publishing, pp. 43–56. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60600-2_4
US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) (2020) Dietary supplement products & ingredients. Available at http://www.fda.gov/Food/DietarySupplements/ProductsIngredients/default.htm
Tucker J, Fischer T, Upjohn L, Mazzera D, Kumar M (2018) Unapproved Pharmaceutical Ingredients Included in Dietary Supplements Associated With US Food and Drug Administration Warnings. JAMA Network Open 1:e183337
Maughan RJ, Burke LM, Dvorak J, Larson-Meyer DE, Peeling P, Phillips SM, Rawson ES, Walsh NP, Garthe I, Geyer H, Meeusen R, Van Loon LJC, Shirreffs SM, Spriet LL, Stuart M, Vernec A, Currell K, Ali VM, Budgett RG, Engebretsen L (2018) IOC consensus statement: dietary supplements and the high-performance athlete. Br J Sports Med 52:439–455. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2018-099027
Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN) (2018) Consumer Survey on Dietary Supplements. Available at www.crnusa.org/CRNConsumerSurvey
Garthe I, Maughan RJ (2018) Athletes and supplements: Prevalence and perspectives. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 28:126–138. https://doi.org/10.1123/ijsnem.2017-0429
Braun H, Koehler K, Geyer H, Kleiner J, Mester J, Schanzer W (2009) Dietary supplement use among elite young German athletes. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 19:97–109
Baylis A, Cameron-Smith D, Burke LM (2011) Inadvertent doping through supplement use by athletes: assessment and management of the risk in Australia. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 11:365–383
Froiland K, Koszewski W, Hingst J, Kopecky L (2004) Nutritional supplement use among college athletes and their sources of information. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 14:104–120
Wardenaar FC, Ceelen IJM, Van Dijk JW, Hangelbroek RWJ, Van Roy L, Van Der Pouw B, De Vries JHM, Mensink M, Witkamp RF (2017) Nutritional supplement use by Dutch elite and sub-elite athletes: Does receiving dietary counseling make a difference? Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 27:32–42. https://doi.org/10.1123/ijsnem.2016-0157
Knapik JJ, Steelman RA, Hoedebecke SS, Austin KG, Farina EK, Lieberman HR (2016) Prevalence of dietary supplement use by athletes: systematic review and meta-analysis. Sports Med 46:103–123. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40279-015-0387-7
Lun V, Erdman KA, Fung TS, Reimer RA (2012) Dietary supplementation practices in Canadian high-performance athletes. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 22:31–37. https://doi.org/10.1123/ijsnem.22.1.31
Petroczi A, Naughton DP (2008) The age-gender-status profile of high performing athletes in the UK taking nutritional supplements: Lessons for the future. J Int Soc Sports Nutr 5:2. https://doi.org/10.1186/1550-2783-5-2
Backhouse SH, Whitaker L, Petroczi A (2013) Gateway to doping? Supplement use in the context of preferred competitive situations, doping attitude, beliefs, and norms. Scand J Med Sci Sports 23:244–252
Kandel D (1975) Stages in adolescent involvement in drug use. Science 190:912–914
Lazuras L, Barkoukis V, Mallia L, Lucidi F, Brand R (2017) More than a feeling: the role of anticipated regret in predicting doping intentions in adolescent athletes. Psychol Sport Exerc 30:196–204
Hurst P, Kavussanu M, Boardley I, Ring C (2019) Sport supplement use predicts doping attitudes and likelihood via sport supplement beliefs. J Sports Sci 37(15):1734–1740. https://doi.org/10.1080/02640414.2019.1589920
Corazza O, Simonato P, Demetrovics Z, Mooney R, van de Ven K, Roman-Urresterazu A, Rácmolnár L, De Luca I, Cinosi E, Santacroce R, Marini M, Wellsted D, Sullivan K, Bersani G, Martinotti G (2019) The emergence of exercise addiction, body dysmorphic disorder, and other image-related psychopathological correlates in fitness settings: a cross sectional study. PLoS ONE 14:e0213060. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0213060
Geyer H, Parr MK, Koehler K, Mareck U, Schanzer W, Thevis M (2008) Nutritional supplements cross-contaminated and faked with doping substances. J Mass Spectrom 43:892–902
Martello S, Felli M, Chiarotti M (2007) Survey of nutritional supplements for selected illegal anabolic steroids and ephedrine using LC-MS/MS and GC-MS methods, respectively. Food Addit Contam 24:258–265
Ayotte C, Lévesque JF, Cléroux M, Lajeunesse A, Goudreault D, Fakirian A (2001) Sport nutritional supplements: quality and doping controls. Can J Appl Physiol Rev Can Physiol Appl 26:S120–S129
Mazzoni I, Barroso O, Rabin O (2017) Anti-doping challenges with novel psychoactive substances in sport. In: Novel psychoactive substances. Springer, Berlin, pp 43–56
Van Thuyne W, Van Eenoo P, Delbeke FT (2006) Nutritional supplements: Prevalence of use and contamination with doping agents. Nutr Res Rev 19:147–158
Judkins CMG, Teale P, Hall DJ (2010) The role of banned substance residue analysis in the control of dietary supplement contamination. Drug Test Anal 2:417–420
Geller AI, Shehab N, Weidle NJ, Lovegrove MC, Wolpert BJ, Timbo BB et al (2015) Emergency department visits for adverse events related to dietary supplements. N Engl J Med 373:1531–1540
Mathews NM (2018) Prohibited contaminants in dietary supplements. Sports Health 10:19–30. https://doi.org/10.1177/1941738117727736
Tian HH, Ong WS, Tan CL (2009) Nutritional supplement use among university athletes in Singapore. Singapore Med J 50:165–172
US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) (1994) Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA). Available at https://ods.od.nih.gov/About/DSHEA_Wording.aspx
European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) (2015) Food supplements. Available at: http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/topics/topic/food-supplements
Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) (2019) Sport supplements in Australia. Available at https://www.tga.gov.au/media-release/sports-supplements-australia#:~:text=Supplements%20may%20be%20regulated%20as,medicine%20can%20sometimes%20be%20complex.
Deng H (2015) Chinese new regulation for health food products. Natural Products Insider Website. Available at: http://www.naturalproductsinsider.com/articles/2015/10/chinese-new-regulation-for-health-food-product.aspx. Updated 2015.
Denham BE (2017) Athlete information sources about dietary supplements: A review of extant research. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 27:325–334
Heikkinen A, Alaranta A, Helenius I, Vasankari T (2011) Dietary supplementation habits and perceptions of supplement use among elite Finnish athletes. Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 21:271–279
Pilgrim K, Bohnet-Joschko S (2019) Selling health and happiness how influencers communicate on Instagram about dieting and exercise: mixed methods research. BMC Public Health 19:1–9. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7387-8
Martínez-Sanz JM, Sospedra I, Ortiz CM, Baladía E, Gil-Izquierdo A, Ortiz-Moncada R (2017) Intended or unintended doping? A review of the presence of doping substances in dietary supplements used in sports. In Nutrients 9:10. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu9101093
Corazza O, Assi S, Simonato P, Corkery J, Bersani FS, Demetrovics Z, Stair J, Fergus S, Pezzolesi C, Pasinetti M, Deluca P, Drummond C, Davey Z, Blaszko U, Moskalewicz J, Mervo B, Furia LD, Farre M, Flesland L, Pisarska A, Shapiro H, Siemann H, Skutle A, Sferrazza E, Torrens M, Sambola F, van der Kreeft P, Scherbaum N, Schifano F. (2013) Promoting innovation and excellence to face the rapid diffusion of novel psychoactive substances in the EU: the outcomes of the ReDNet project. Hum Psychopharmacol 28(4):317–23. https://doi.org/10.1002/hup.2299
Kozinets RV (2015) Netnography: redefined. Sage, London
Negri A, Townshend H, McSweeney T, Angelopoulou O, Banayoti H, Prilutskaya M, Bowden-Jones O, Corazza O. (2021) Carfentanil on the darknet: potential scam or alarming public health threat? International Journal of Drug Policy, 91: 103118. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2021.103118
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Negri, A., Townshend, H.D., Corazza, O. (2022). Untested Supplement Use Among Athletes: An Overlooked Phenomenon?. In: Rabin, O., Corazza, O. (eds) Emerging Drugs in Sport. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-79293-0_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-79293-0_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-79292-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-79293-0
eBook Packages: MedicineMedicine (R0)