Objective   To analyze the status quo of functional food for improving nutritional anemia officially registered in China for providing evidences to relevant research and development of enterprises and governmental supervision.

  Methods   From the website of China Food and Drug Administration (CFDA) and State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), we extracted the information on 228 functional food products (FFPs) for improving nutritional anemia officially registered in China from March 1996 through February 2010. Dosage form, function claim, composition of traditional Chinese medicine, content of iron-compound, and content measurement of functional/marker components of the FFPs were analyze with general descriptive analysis, visual data analysis, factor analysis and principal component analysis using Ucinet 6 and SPSS 22.0. Social network mapping was performed to display the utilization frequency of the 73 traditional Chinese medicine and their extracts and other bioactive compounds which were included in the ingredients of the three or more of the FFPs.

  Results   Of the 228 FFPs in 7 dosage forms, 117 (51.3%) are oral liquids. The main raw materials were listed the ingredients of 197 (86.4%) of the FFPs. Angelica sinensis and its extract, Astragalus membranaceus and its extract, donkey-hide gelatin, Chinese-date and its extract, and iron and its compound are among the components locating in central region of the social network map constructed. Traditional Chinese medicine raw material and medicine food homology raw material were listed in the ingredients of 157 FFPs. Among 14 top traditional Chinese medicine raw material most frequently used in the FFPs, seven common factors (Angelica sinensis and Astragalus mongholicus, Poria cocos and Chinese yam, prepared rehmannia root and Codonopsis pilosula, Paeonia Lactiflora, mulberry, longan, Lycium chinensis and black-bone chicken) were identified, contributing a cumulative variance of 72.378. Among the 165 FFPs with iron-compound in the ingredients, 130 (78.8%) contain traditional Chinese medicine raw material. The top 5 iron-compounds utilized in the 165 FFPs are ferrous lactate (in 46 FFPs), ferrous gluconate (43), heme chloride (30), ferrous fumarate (9), and ehylenediaminetetraacetic acid ferric sodium (8), respectively. Of the 70 FFPs approved by the Ministry of Health of the People′s Republic of China, 42 (60.0%) indicated the contents of functional/marker components in the products′ registration information; all the 158 FFPs approved by CFDA and SAMR indicated the contents of functional/marker components in the products′ registration information, with the top 3 most frequently listed functional/marker components of iron (in the ingredients of 76% of the 158 FFPs), polysaccharide (29.5%), and total saponins (22%).

  Conclusion   For the officially registered FFPs for improving nutritional anemia, the combination and types of utilized traditional Chinese medicine raw material is relatively identical and there is lack of known specific correlation between the utilized traditional Chinese medicine raw material and the implied effect of functional/marker components.