Dietary Supplement Testing
ADSI and BSCG (Banned Substances Control Group) offer dietary supplement testing options to protect athletes and consumers from dietary and nutritional supplements that are contaminated with banned and dangerous drugs.
Dietary supplements are used today by large majorities of athletes, police and military recruits and consumers at large, recent studies show. Such products, which include vitamins, minerals, energy products, amino acids, and protein powders, present challenges when used by those subject to drug testing. Similarly, powerful pharmaceutical compounds can sometimes be present in a product that can be detrimental to a person’s overall health. Quality control testing requirements in the dietary supplement industry do not address these concerns.
As a result of the United States’ Dietary Supplement Health & Education Act of 1994, supplements face much less regulation than do drugs because supplements are categorized as food, not medicine. The FDA (Food & Drug Administration) spot checks supplement products for hidden drugs or contamination but it is not their job to ensure the safety or integrity of such products. The responsibility for the safety, efficacy, and quality of a dietary supplement lies with the manufacturer of the product.
Due to the lack of regulation, confusion arises about which supplements are okay to consume. Use of the wrong supplement can lead an athlete to test positive for a banned substance or a consumer to face adverse health consequences. Indeed, supplement use has been found to be behind a number of positive sports drug tests and has had a detrimental impact on the careers of drug-tested professionals like police officers.
The trusted Catlin-led organizations ADSI and BSCG seek to remedy these problems through gold standard dietary supplement testing. With a rigorous testing menu focused on drugs prohibited in sport and also prescription and over-the-counter drugs, the BSCG Certified Drug Free® supplement certification approach protects finished products, raw materials, or manufacturing facilities from risk of infiltration with more than 400 drugs.
BSCG’s Certified Drug Free ® dietary supplement certification offers responsible manufacturers a way to demonstrate their products do not contain banned and dangerous drugs and allows athletes and consumers to rest assured that a product has been tested with methods sensitive enough to reveal even the smallest concentrations of potentially problematic substances. Similar in concept but applied directly on behalf of the athlete, BSCG’s Athlete Assurance Program provides athletes the opportunity to have products of their choosing tested prior to use.
ADSI offers legal analysis and consulting support to the sport and anti-doping community. We are also available to help athletes review products before using them or to assist in the event a problem arises as a result of supplement use. ADSI also specializes in design and implementation of urine drug-testing programs.
Supplement Disclaimer: The BSCG Certified Drug Free® seal indicates that a supplement has been tested and that no banned substances were detected within established thresholds. We remind athletes and consumers that the efficacy and safety of a supplement is the responsibility of the manufacturer to demonstrate and the consumer to research. Athletes and drug-tested professionals need to be aware of the strict liability they have for substances that appear in their bodies.
ADSI and BSCG encourage consumers to seek peer-reviewed research and other available credible information when considering the use of supplement-related products and to explore carefully the active ingredients in those products and their possible relevance to drug-testing programs before considering use. Drug-tested professionals, including athletes, should only consider using supplements that have been tested and certified to be free of drugs by a quality third-party dietary supplement certification provider like BSCG.
