Assessment of nutraceuticals and food supplements.

It is now possible to define food supplements on the basis of their preclinical or clinical action. Nutraceuticals and food supplements when used as drugs to prevent or treat clinical conditions could be defined as Pre-drugs (Preventive drugs or pre-clinical drugs). Nutraceuticals, when used with the aim to limit the continuous use of patented drugs, theoretically more dangerous, more expensive and causing more interactions could be defined as Substitutive-low-risk (SLR)-drugs.For these natural products the real ground of evaluation is the patient, or the subject at risk, possibly, the borderline patient. In this supplement, our research group and network present some of our recent research and innovations particularly focusing on 'natural compounds' of very high preventive and clinical potentials. The combination of so many experts from different medical fields makes this interaction very interesting and promising. More studies and more applications for nutraceuticals and food supplements are coming.