Perspectives on the Use of Proprietary Blends in Dietary Supplements

This paper discusses the rationale for use of proprietary blends on dietary supplement labels, and their implications for researchers and consumers. The Dietary Supplement Health Education Act of 1994 allows the listing of nonnutrient dietary ingredients as proprietary blends on dietary supplement labels for companies to protect their unique formulas. The weight of the blend and names of the ingredients within the blends must be declared, but not the amounts of the individual ingredients within the proprietary blend. Thus, from label information, the amount of a dietary ingredient in a proprietary blend is not available for calculating exposures in assessments of intakes or for determining doses in clinical trials.