The new research was published in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition. It was conducted a team of researchers associated with US Army and Navy health institutes.
The researchers were looking at the prevalence of use for a category of products they referred to as ‘sports-related nutritional supplements,’ (SRNS) which they defined as sports drinks, sports bars and sports gels.
The researchers examined this category of products as being distinct from dietary supplements as a whole. They based this distinction on the fact that most of these products are sold as foods.
These kinds of products do tend to straddle the supplement/foods divide, with some being sold formally as supplements while others list a Nutrition Facts panel on the back. The difference is generally the choice of the manufacturer, as the formulas may be quite similar in many cases.
Study based on large data set
The researchers used data collected by a wider survey looking at dietary supplement use among troops. That survey collected data from more than 26,000 active service members, of whom about 88% were male.
The sports product study further parsed that data to determine what kind of SRNS service members were using and how often. They also wanted to find out more about the service members themselves to see if they could glean any factors that might drive greater usage. And finally, the researchers wanted to ascertain the rate of self-reported adverse events (AEs) associated with these products.
Overall the researchers found that 45% of active service members used at least one SRNS a week. Sports drinks were the most often used category, followed fairly closely by sports bars. Only a few (3%) of the service members reported using a sports gel.