Objective:

Determine the prevalence and characteristics of nutraceutical consumption in undergraduate students at a private university in Medellín, Colombia.

Materials:

A descriptive cross-sectional study was performed. The population constituted of undergraduate students enrolled during the 2013 academic year and a simple random sampling was performed. SPSS program version 17 was used to analyze the data. Nutraceutical consumption ratios were estimated by sex and age group. Percentages were estimated for nominal and ordinal variables, and for the reason type variables the media and standard deviation were estimated. Confidence intervals of 95% were calculated for the proportions of prevalence consumption. Statistical significance was evaluated with the probability value c2 test.

Results:

427 students participated, the average age was 20.8 years (SD: 3.1), 56.1% were women. The prevalence of lifetime consumption of nutraceuticals was 66.3% and 51.8% were consumed annually. The main reasons for consumption were food complement (32.8%) and disease prevention (20.1%).

Conclusion:

The high prevalence of nutraceutical intake observed in the study is comparable to studies performed with similar populations reported in the literature, suggesting an upward trend in the habit of consuming dietary supplements.

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