EFFECTS OF A DIETARY SUPPLEMENT ON THE INCIDENCE OF ACUTE RESPIRATORY INFECTIONS IN SUSCEPTIBLE ADULTS: A RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study, published as a randomized controlled trial.

To assess the effect of a nutritional supplement with micronutrients and plant extracts on the incidence of ARI in susceptible adults between January and April, 2012.

Fisher's exact test was used to compare the proportion of ill subjects between groups.

Who Took Part

PubMed indexes the participants as young adults and adults, both men and women.

Participants were adults susceptible to ARI who were healthy at the time of evaluation, signed informed consent forms and were not taking medication.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled and parallel-group study.

Random assignment meant chance, not the researchers, decided who got the intervention named in the title and who got the comparison, which limits bias.

As a double-blind study, the assignments were hidden from both participants and investigators until the end.

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the intervention group a baseline to be compared against.

The intervention group and the comparison group ran side by side rather than switching.

A randomized, double-blind, parallel, placebo- controlled clinical trial was performed.

They completed a medical history; weight, height, vital signs and laboratory analyses were assessed.

Those who became ill notified researchers and the attending physician confirmed the presence of an infection.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Acute Disease, Biomarkers, Body Weights and Measures, Dietary Supplements, Disease Susceptibility, Exercise and Incidence.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

Its findings take up roughly 4 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2015 (Nutricion hospitalaria), a journal based in Spain.

More context: all human trials.