We analysed 22,052 side effect reports made in Australia in 2023. Here’s what we found.

We analysed 22,052 medical side effects reports made in 2023, to answer one question:

Which dietary supplements are receiving the most side effect reports in Australia?

Specifically, we looked at complaints of adverse events made to the Database of Adverse Event Notifications (DAEN) in 2023.

In this post, I’m going to share what we discovered.

Summary

• A popular cold & flu supplement had a total of 110 side effect cases - the most of any dietary supplement in Australia.
• Females made up 76% of the total number of side effect cases.
• Despite being around 16% of the population, over 27% of side effect cases were by someone aged over 65.
• Magnesium-based sleep and pain product had the second most reported cases - with 98% of these 68 cases being reported by females.
• A popular probiotic had a total of 24 complaints, mostly centred around abdominal pain, nausea and dyspepsia.
• Some of the most common complaints included anaphylactic reaction, vomiting, diarrhoea, headache and fatigue.
• A female reproductive product received 14 reports, including 3 reports of suicidal ideation.
• A common bone density supplement received 37 complaints of side effects - though over half of these were associated with incorrect use of the product.

A popular cold & flu supplement had most reported side effect cases

We found that a dietary supplement that is designed to reduce the severity of upper respiratory tract infections had more cases of adverse events than any other dietary supplement in Australia in 2023, with a total of 110 cases.

In fact, it was significantly higher than the supplement in second place, which had only 68 reports of side effects in 2023.

This included 26 reports of ageusia (loss of taste), 20 reports of diarrhoea, and 20 reports of vomiting.

Females made up the majority of side effect cases

Even for supplements that were not gender specific, females made up a disproportionately large fraction of the total number of side effect cases reported to DAEN in 2023.

In total, they made up 76% of the total case numbers where the gender of the user was known.

It is not clear whether this is because women consume dietary supplements in greater numbers than men, whether they report side effects more readily, or whether they are more susceptible to adverse events.

Older Australians made up a disproportionately large number of cases

Similarly, Australians aged over 65 years old constituted a disproportionately large fraction of the total reported cases.

This demographic makes up about 16% of the population, yet they accounted for 27% of cases where the age of the supplement user was known.

Magnesium-based relaxation supplement had the second highest number of cases and almost all were by females

As mentioned earlier, females made up a disproportionately large number of reported cases in 2023, even for non-gender specific supplements.

A popular magnesium based supplement, designed to assist with fatigue, stress and anxiety, is one of these. It received a total of 68 adverse event reports in 2023, the second highest number.

98% of the reports relating to this product where the gender of the user was known were by females.

Large number of gastrointestinal disorder complaints reported for a popular probiotic

This probiotic is designed to support metabolic rate and blood sugar levels.

It received 24 reports of adverse events in 2023, with the most common reactions being abdominal pain (8 reports), nausea (8 reports) and dyspepsia (5 reports).

Anaphylactic reaction, vomiting, diarrhoea, headache and fatigue were the most common complaints

Across the entire dataset of side effect complaints in 2023, there were a wide range of reactions/symptoms reported.

For dietary supplements, the most common included anaphylactic reaction, vomiting, diarrhoea, headache and fatigue.

Female reproductive product had multiple reports of suicidal ideation

A dietary supplement designed to support the female reproductive system received 14 adverse event reports in 2023.

3 of these included reports of suicidal ideation.

Over half of the complaints for a bone strength supplement were related to incorrect product usage

A popular dietary supplement designed to support bone density, strength and development was found to have received 37 reports of adverse events in 2023.

21 cases for this supplement included reports of ‘Wrong technique in product usage process’.

Conclusion

Thanks for taking the time to look through our analysis of 22,052 side effect reports made to the DAEN in 2023.

Feel free to quote any of the statistics, or use any of the charts in this report for your own work, as long as you provide attribution in the form of a link back to this page.

It's important to note that inclusion in the DAEN is not confirmation that the reported side effect is attributable to the supplement in question - it may be a coincidence, or due to other medication being consumed at the same time.

It's also important to understand that supplement usage data has not been considered as part of this analysis.

Therefore, inclusion in this list does not necessarily mean that a particular supplement experiences greater rates of adverse events.

Popular supplements are consumed more heavily than less popular supplements, and therefore it is unsurprising that they receive higher numbers of adverse event notifications.

Method

To prepare the analysis above, all 22,052 side effect reports made in 2023 to the Database of Adverse Event Notifications (DAEN) were gathered from their website.

The results were filtered to remove products like vaccinations and medications that do not constitute dietary supplements.

From the remaining data, analysis was performed to rank all supplements based on the total number of adverse event reports, as well as break this data down by age, gender and side effect reaction type.

For more information on how this study was performed, or any other general questions, get in touch at louis@supplemento.com.au.