Use of Dietary Supplements in the United States

Audiologists, as part of their clinical practice, may review and/or solicit information regarding their patient’s medications. While a given patient may take prescription medications, some may be obtained over-the-counter. These may include dietary supplements. 

Stierman, Couch, Ghache and Mishra (2026) used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) to examine dietary supplement use by youths (0-19 years) and adults (20 years plus). NHANES participants were queried “if they had used or taken any vitamins, minerals, herbals, or other dietary supplements in the past 30 days, including prescription and over-the-counter supplements”. Between August 2021–August 2023, 35.7 percent of youths and 60.2 percent of adults reported positive use. These authors further reported that 11.3 percent of youths and 38.7 percent of adults took two or more dietary supplements.

Stierman and colleagues (2026) also compared dietary supplement use from August 2021-August 2023 to 2013-2014, 2015-2016, and 2017–March 2020. They found that there was a significantly increasing linear trend over the years for adults, but not for youths, taking any dietary supplement. There also was a linear increasing trend for both youths and adults taking two or more supplements.

These authors further evaluated use of dietary supplements between August 2021-2023 by sex and age. Interested readers are referred to the full report for these details.

Reference

Stierman, B., Couch, C. A., Gahche, J. J., & Mishra, S. (2026). Dietary supplement use: United States, August 2021–August 2023. NCHS Data Brief. (561):1─11. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/