By taking a walk through any pharmacy, supermarket or online store, it is easy to find melatonin as the definitive solution to sleep problems and with the great claim of being something totally natural that our body secretes. Pills, drops, infusions or even gummies are some of the presentations in which we find a product that for many should not be available to everyone and that, in their opinion, It should be regulated like any other medicine.
The alarm voice. The scientific community and regulatory bodies They are starting to sound the alarm and the central idea is clear: melatonin is not as harmless as it is often promoted and, according to experts, it should be treated with the same rigor as a medication, and not as a simple vitamin supplement.
The labels. One of the biggest problems with melatonin, especially in countries like the United States where it is regulated as a dietary supplement, is the lack of strict control over its production. Here a study published in 2017 put a worrying fact on the table when seeing that there are a great variability between what the labels say and what the bottle actually contains.
And when analyzing multiple brands, researchers found products that contained from 83% less melatonin than declared, to an alarming 478% more. And if that were not enough, the study detected the presence of serotonin in several of these supplements, which is a neurotransmitter that is regulated.
It’s not something magical. Marketing has positioned melatonin as a universal solution for sleep that can be consumed without almost any type of control or limit. But here the different reviews conclude that its benefits are modest, without having a powerful hypnotic effect, but rather that its real usefulness lies in adjusting specific circadian rhythm disorders such as jet lag, so use should be selective and not routine.
Furthermore, it is not without risks. One of the most striking is the incompatibility that taking melatonin may have. with anticoagulant medicationswhich requires medical supervision. This is something that a priori is not known to patients as they do not go to the doctor for a prescription and have melatonin available on a supermarket shelf.
The silent danger. The rise of melatonin in gummy form has brought with it very serious collateral damage, since children may see it as a candy, which has led to an increase in visits to the emergency room in the United States due to excessive consumption of melatonin.
In Spain, The approach taken is more strict, since drug regulatory agencies evaluate the safety of this substance in the key of medicinealthough you can buy it almost without any type of control when going to any supermarket. The positive part here is that the highest concentrations of melatonin can only be prescribed by a doctor in consultation so that the pharmacy can make a master preparation, considering it as just another medication, which is what is requested internationally.
Images | James Yarema Slaapwijsheid.nl
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