Thank you for your inquiry regarding our Synergy Products. We do have a family who we have contracted to grow our Chinese Herbs, who live in China, who make the extract prepared in traditional fashion for our Pure Synergy. Dr. May has established this relationship with these growers years ago and the herbs are grown organically to meet our strict requirements. Every product regardless of its origin is placed in quarantine and sent off to a lab to be tested to make certain it meets our strict standards. If it does not it is returned to where it came from regardless of where that may be on the planet.
Comparing amounts of ascorbic acid to the whole food vitamin C in Pure Radiance C is a bit difficult because they are not really the same thing. Whole food vitamin C is much more than ascorbic acid, as this acid is always connected to a multitude of other compounds wherever it is found in food sources. The health benefits we associate with vitamin C come from not only ascorbic acid but from the synergistic interaction of numerous phytonutrients including bioflavinoids, polyphenols, catechins, anthocyanins, rutin, enzymes and tyrosinase. Studies have also shown that whole food vitamin C is also more bioavailable than isolated ascorbic acid. Ascorbic acid can be very hard on your stomach, because it is acidic inside the body, unlike whole food vitamin C, which is alkalizing.
Concerning potency, again it is difficult to compare synthetic isolated ascorbic acid and the whole food nutrition in Pure Radiance C. In general, potency of any product depends on the quality of the ingredients and how carefully they are handled. Pure Radiance C offers high quality, 100% natural vitamin C made with wildcrafted and organic ingredients, bottled in amber glass to protect its nutrients.
I hope this information is helpful. Please be in touch if you have further questions about this or any other questions that we might answer for you.
Again, we appreciate your interest in Pure Radiance C!
Thank you for your interest in The Synergy Company products.
ConsumerLab.com was kind enough to give us a list of six brands that we should avoid and the reasons why. For a small fee, they'll give us the rest of the list. Hmmmm! Here is the short list that they released of the failed brands:
1. Nature's Plus Especially Yours Women's Multivitamin ... may not fully be absorbed. 2. AARP Maturity formula ... may not fully be absorbed. 3. Now Adam Superior Men's Multivitamin ... may not fully be absorbed. 4. Vitamin Shoppe Multivitamins Especially For Women ... contains 15.3 micrograms of lead per serving. 5. Hero Nutritionals Yummi Bears ... contains a high percentage of Vitamin A which can weaken bones and cause liver damage. 6. Eniva Vibe ... contains only 54% of claimed Vitamin A.
NOW responds to test results from consumer organization
2.01.07 Response to Testing on NOW multiple vitamin.
Recently, NOW’s ADAM men’s multiple vitamin was subjected to analytical testing by a well publicized for-profit company and rated as “not approved”. The reason given was that it failed to break apart properly, which is tested by product disintegration. NOW has a Quality Control (QC) department with a physical lab that actually does disintegration tests on our tablets. Every lot must pass the QC tests for disintegration, among other quality standards, before it is offered for sale. We are confident every lot meets all of our Good Manufacturing Practices safety and functional specifications. The organization which tested the disintegration of our ADAM product used a pharmaceutical standard for disintegration of supplements within 30 minutes for tablets and 45 minutes for capsules. There is no general industry agreement that this standard is applicable or useful for dietary supplements like Adam. Adam Multiple Vitamin has been tested by NOW QC to disintegrate within 20-40 minutes. Most vitamins are taken with food, which takes several hours for digestion, and therefore the absorption time is well within the real world situation. There is no safety issue.
The report also stated our product exceeded the upper limit for niacin, which can cause “ flushing “ or redness of skin color. NOW Adam contains only flush-free forms called niacinamide (nicotinamide) and inositol hexanicotinate niacinamide. These forms do not cause flushing making the upper limit for niacin irrelevant. We have since asked for and received some clarification of this information on the testing company’s website. NOW appreciates this cooperation in providing more accurate information to consumers.
NOW Adam Multiple vitamin should be rated as “Approved”. Adam has passed in house disintegration tests and does not cause a niacin flush.
If you have any further questions about NOW products and our quality standards, please contact the NOW Nutritionists at 888-669-3663 Ext. 5
For more information on disintegration testing and the upper limit for niacin, access the articles below.
Every lot of each NOW formula that is made into tablet form is tested for proper disintegration to ensure that you get the full benefit of the ingredients. NOW has a QC (Quality Control) department with a physical testing lab that does disintegration tests on tablets. Our trained technicians measure disintegration of the tablet samples using USP method < 2040 > on accurately calibrated equipment. This is the accepted industry method.
While the pharmacopeia disintegration test method is the accepted industry standard, its recommended times for disintegration are simply not appropriate or accepted for all dietary supplements. The pharmaceutical compendial standard for disintegration of vitamins and minerals is to allow no greater than 30 minutes for tablets and 45 minutes for capsules; which actually is counterintuitive, considering that capsules normally are believed to disintegrate more quickly than tablets. In fact, this difference is well-accepted by consumers.
Furthermore, many dietary supplements are formulated to contain natural ingredients other than vitamins and minerals, with natural physical characteristics that can vary. Since food often lingers in the stomach for an hour or two during digestion and most vitamins are designed to be taken with meals, the 30 minute recommended standard based on a drug model is unnecessary and unrealistic for many natural products. There is no sound reason to apply this model to formulas containing ingredients other than isolated vitamins and minerals.
NOW has a specific specification for disintegration of each tableted product, typically 45 minutes. Capsules are typically tested to disintegrate within a 40 minute window, but some capsule materials (hard 2-piece gelatin, gelatin softgels, cellulose or polysaccharide Vcaps) disintegrate within different timeframes that may be shorter. Of course, enteric coated and sustained release formulas will take longer to disintegrate, by design.
Advanced nutrient forms - such as coenzyme forms of vitamins or chelated minerals - may actually be degraded by excessive time in the acidic stomach. This may be a cause for concern if tablets disintegrate too quickly.
NOW Foods sets its own standards for disintegration times based on scientific and nutritional knowledge, manufacturing experience, product design and consumer acceptance. We are confident that every lot produced in our facility using independently audited Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) meets all of our critical specifications. The disintegration times of our tablets are set to be very slightly longer than competitive products. This is because we compact more nutrients into each tablet than other brands. Our goal is to give you greater value through nutrition.
During 2005 and 2006 all 20 Adam Multivitamin tablet lots manufactured by NOW Foods passed our validated disintegration testing and met specifications for release. Disintegration times for this particular formula ranged between 20-40 minutes, with a maximum of 45 minutes allowed. Testing by an independent lab has confirmed that samples from one lot of Adam tablets disintegrated within 40 minutes, meeting NOW’s own specification.
You can be assured that the highly skilled Quality Control Technicians at NOW Foods continually monitor our production of tablets and test every lot for proper disintegration within our specified timeframes. This competence ensures that the contents of our tablets will be available because the tablet will deliver the active ingredients to your stomach.
現在のFoodsの非常に熟練したQuality Control Techniciansが絶えずあらゆるロット単位で適切な崩壊のために私たちの指定された時間枠の中で私たちのタブレットとテストの生産をモニターするので、安心してください。 この能力は、タブレットが有効成分をあなたの胃に送るので私たちのタブレットのコンテンツが利用可能になるのを確実にします。