96 | Smarter Supplementing: Herbs, Isolates, and Long‑Term Thinking

0:00 Welcome to In the Clinic with Camille. My name is Camille Freeman. I'm an herbalist and nutritionist, and in this podcast, I share little tips and tidbits that might be helpful for other practitioners. Today, I wanted to share a follow-up thought after teaching the first class in my supplement deep dive earlier this week. For those of you who are not in the supplement deep dive, this class was about smarter supplementing. And so what we did in the class was really an overview of some of my thoughts on the philosophy of supplements. We talked about the definitions and ethical concerns and considerations around recommending supplements, and then also dove more into why we would recommend them, why we would not recommend them, thoughts on how long people take them, the reasons we're taking them, whether those are justified, all of that sort of thing.

0:46 To be super clear, again, for those of you who weren't in the class, I think most of you know this, but just to make sure we're all on the same page, here in the United States, the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act, also known as DISHAY, from 1994, is how we define a supplement officially. And they define it as a product intended for ingestion that, among other requirements, contains a dietary ingredient intended to supplement the diet. So it's a little bit circuitous, but that is the definition, and it includes vitamins, minerals, herbs, botanicals, amino acids, dietary substances such as berberine that are a part of one of the categories above, things like protein powders, protein bars, etc. Those are all considered dietary supplements.

1:35 One of the points that I was making in this class is that when a client is taking a supplement over a long period of time with the intended outcome of preventing a condition or disease, which technically we are not supposed to do as practitioners, we are not supposed to recommend that because that is practicing medicine outside of our scope. But a lot of people are taking supplements with the idea that, oh, this is good for my heart. This is good for my, you know, it's shown to prevent dementia or whatever else. One of the points that I made in this class is that realistically, if you are taking a supplement with the idea that it's going to prevent something or lower your risk of some kind of disease or condition, 10, 20, 40 years down the road, it is a gamble.

2:21 In almost all cases, not all, in very few cases, do we have solid human evidence showing cause and effect in a clinically meaningful effect size that a specific supplement is going to meaningfully reduce your risk or prevent certain conditions. Again, it's not nothing, it's not never, but most of the time, that is a maybe we're taking this on a sort of just-in-case basis. So we talked about the implications of this, and if it makes sense, and under which circumstances, and so forth. And I think that's an important point, and I think it's one that a lot of people don't think through fully. We fleshed that out in the class. However, the reason that I was lying in bed thinking, gosh, I think I might have missed explaining a certain aspect of this, is at the end of the class, somebody asked, well, Camille, what about things like herbs or mushrooms, you know, reishi and lion's mane, and some of these things.

3:17 How do we think about recommending those or people who are working with those for long-term use? And I have a couple things to say about this that I, again, did not say in the class and meant to, should have, etc. One of them is that because our definition of supplement is so big in this country, I think there's a very large spectrum of what falls into that category. So in my mind, taking a single nutrient such as vitamin A or magnesium or something like that is in many ways akin to taking a specific phytochemical from an herb in an isolated form in a higher dose than we might be getting it from just consuming that herb in a more standard way and taking it by itself and then looking to see what happens.

4:09 So this is, in my opinion, a lot closer to kind of our pharmaceutical model of medicine, where we're taking these specific components outside of their standard food or plant matrix, and then using them in doses that are generally higher than what we might ingest them in in one sitting. Not that that's always bad, not that that's never a good thing, or it's never helpful for people, but that's how I think about that. Then in terms of herbs, if we're looking at a whole plant model where you're taking the herb and you're grinding it up and putting that powder on something, or we are making an herbal infusion or an herbal decoction for people who don't know what that is, basically just tea.

4:52 If we're making an herbal tea, in my opinion, it's a lot closer to food's. So I think we also don't have, you know, we don't have great evidence about carrots to be like, oh, well, you know, if you eat X number of carrots every day for 30 years, you're going to reduce your risk of heart disease or what have you. But we do have good evidence about eating a very diet rich in vegetables and fiber being associated with lower risk of things. So I think about herbs as being in the long-term preventative sense as being closer to foods where we're like, yeah, any single herb does not have studies for the most part looking at long-term effects over decades. However, there's reason to believe that incorporating herbs into your diet, the same as you do fruits and vegetables, is expanding your sort of phytochemical regime, unlikely to cause harm in most cases if you're taking some of the more, you know, gentle, accessible herbs that are food-like.

5:50 And there's, you know, I don't think it's the worst idea in the world, just like I wouldn't say, no, we don't have evidence for carrots, so you shouldn't eat them. On the other hand, if we are taking a single isolated constituent of an herb and we are putting it in a gel cap in a plastic bottle and extracting it in some factory somewhere and shipping it across the country and saying you're going to take that with the idea that it might be. Support your health over 20 years or something like that. I think it's a cause for a little bit more investigation, a little bit more thought, and a little bit more explanation to our clients about what evidence we have that this is true. So anyway, I'm not sure if that clarifies things for people or if that's a helpful point or if you're like, yeah, Camille, that's just something we already know and think about.

6:36 But I wanted to say it out loud just to be really clear. My points from the class. Other points from the class still stand, which is anytime we're recommending anything to somebody, we need to be really thoughtful about whether this is the best use of their time, of their money, what evidence, either traditional or clinical. Supports its use, and so forth. So there you go. If you have not joined the Supplement Deep Dive and you would like to, it's not too late. You can still join the January class as it was recorded. You can watch it any time. You can join any time throughout 2026. Our next class is going to be with Jacqueline, Sclaver, who is a nutritionist who supports professional and Olympic level athletes, as well as just regular people interested in fitness.

7:23 And she's going to come and talk to us all about the supplements that people often take with the idea that they might be supporting athletic performance and fitness, kind of break down for us what's true, what's not true, what do we need to do about dosing, safety, and that sort of thing. So I'm really excited for somebody with such expertise and such experience to come and share her knowledge. Certainly not something that I know a lot about. So I really, really can't wait for that lecture. Love to have you join us. You can just go to camillefreeman.com slash supplements if you want to learn more. And otherwise, let me know if you have any other questions. Thank you so much for listening, and I'll talk to you later.