Nutraceutical is a combination of "nutritional" and "pharmaceutical" and refers to foods thought to have a beneficial effect on human health. Nutrition is interpreted as the study of the organic process by which an organism assimilates and uses food and liquids for normal functioning, growth and maintenance and to maintain the balance between health and disease. ... Pharmacology (in Greek: pharmacon is drug, and logos is science) is the study of how chemical substances interfere with living systems. ...
Dr. Stephen DeFelice coined the term "Nutraceutical" from "Nutrition" and "Pharmaceutical" in 1989. The term nutraceutical is being commonly used in marketing but has no regulatory definition. Nutrition is the study of the relationship between diet and states of health and disease. ... Pharmacology (in Greek: pharmacon is drug, and logos is science) is the study of how chemical substances interfere with living systems. ... Traditionally, [marketing] has been a term applied to the process or act of bringing together buyers and sellers. ...
Nutraceuticals and functional foods are food components that provide demonstrated physiological benefits or reduce the risk of chronic disease, above and beyond their basic nutritional functions.
A functional food is similar to a conventional food, while a nutraceutical is isolated from a food and sold in dosage form, in both cases the active components occur naturally in the food.
The market for nutraceuticals and functional foods (which is large, global and growing), is being driven by a growing consumer understanding of diet/disease links, aging populations, rising health care costs, and advances in food technology and nutrition.
Nutraceuticals, which have also been called medical foods, designer foods, phytochemicals, functional foods and nutritional supplements, include such everyday products as "bio" yoghurts and fortified breakfast cereals, as well as vitamins, herbal remedies and even genetically modified foods and supplements.
The term "nutraceutical" was coined in 1989 by Stephen De Felice, founder and chairman of the Foundation for Innovation in Medicine, an American organization which encourages medical health research.
He defined a nutraceutical as a "food, or parts of a food, that provide medical or health benefits, including the prevention and treatment of disease".
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