Income Taxes - Protein & Vitamin Supplements

I'm getting my tax information, ready for my preparer, I wonder it its worth adding up all the protein and other "required" nutritional/vitamin supplements that I was told to use and take both during my required insurance class and pre and post surgery.  They are as required as prescription drugs, only seems fair, its not all that much but hey, every legal deduction counts and for medical there is a threshold # of dollars to make it worthwhile.. 

Does anyone have any reality on this or have you had any tax advise about this in the past???

idk, but good idea, i will be sure to save receipts and look into it!

I'm not sure about the protein and vitamins, but I do know my husband and I claimed all of his medical expenses for his surgery last year, and we ended up getting back about $6,000 between federal and state returns.

IRS Publication 502 is what you want. It's a little bit of a grey area, so run it by your tax pro -

Nutritional Supplements

You cannot include in medical expenses the cost of nutritional supplements, vitamins, herbal supplements, “natural medicines,ÂÂ" etc. unless they are recommended by a medical practitioner as treatment for a specific medical condition diagnosed by a physician. Otherwise, these items are taken to maintain your ordinary good health, and are not for medical care.

But then,

Nonprescription Drugs and Medicines

Except for insulin, you cannot include in medical expenses amounts you pay for a drug that is not prescribed.

Example.

Your doctor recommends that you take aspirin. Because aspirin is a drug that does not require a physician's prescription, you cannot include its cost in your medical expenses.




On the one hand they say that something needs to be recommended by a doc to treat a diagnosed medical condition for it to be deductible, but on the other hand, if the doc recommends a non-prescription drug like aspirin, it's not deductible.

My best guess, as a non-professional in the tax game, is that something like your over the counter PPIs might be deductible since it is treating a diagnosed medical condition (and the doc could prescribe a prescription version,) but the general supplements like vitamins and protein shakes would not be. The safest thing is to ask your tax guy how he handles such things, but before even going to that trouble, find out if the those deductions will count - did you self pay for the VSG which means that you will probably be over the 7.5% of adjusted gross income threshold required to deduct med expenses? If you didn't self-pay, or have other major medical expenses that weren't insured, then you probably aren't near that threshold.

Good luck

I was not self pay and I thought the threshold % was more like 2.5%, so that kills it.  I did pay for a hospital copay per day and a bunch of co-pays for endless tests, MRI, Cat Scan, two stress tests, blood, several thousand but not enough for the deduction. etc... but  I don't think it will meet the threshold....to bad for me, maybe someone else can benefit from it...Thanks for the publication......

I would say for next year use an HSA or FSA...I know on the HSA they are qualifying expenses with a letter of medical necessity.  Why pay taxes if you don't have to right?  Also are you going to itemize deductions?  If not it doesn't make a difference for the Federal.  Medical expenses are a Itemized deduction.  So I think going with a spending account might be a better idea look in to it.  With the FSA you have to be careful to spend it all though :) 

I agree, no need to pay if you can legally get out of them, those are the rules!  (always itemize) Oh my, I forgot about these vehicles, the time to set these are up were the year/s before surgery.... I hope, going forward there is less  out of pocket costs of course eventually we all pay medical bills, scripts etc.  I will go over this with my preparer, it still might be worth the effort, thanks for this suggestion... 

Nevertheless, I think this is a great suggestion for those who are about to have surgery, with a fair bit of out of pocket expense, to consider and especially if these vehicles can in anyway lower or get around the threshold %, for these qualified expenses. (not to helpful for those with awesome insurance plans)

My understanding from my dad - who is a tax preparer and who has a spouse *****quires lots of medical supplies, supplements etc - is that the IRS does NOT accept these as deductible medical expenses - but that if your FSA allows them, that is a great way to save some money by spending pre-tax dollars.

Even though protein and supplements are expensive, claiming them is probably not worth the risk of an audit!