What are these ? IU, Mg, MCg, RDA on Multivitamins

I was never good at GK in school and now in adulthood reading IU, Mg, MCG, RDA on multivitamin label brings back not so good old memories. If you are like me then lets learn it!

Firstly they are just plain units of measuring mass.

Mg is short for Milligrams and Mcg is short for Micrograms

100 Mg = 100 milligrams

100 Mcg = 100 micrograms

1 Mg = 1/1000 of a Gram

1 Mcg = 1/1000 of 1 Mg

IU (International Units) is the value of effectiveness (potency)

Its very interesting and know that it is NOT a measurement of mass but how optimally the body absorbs it. There are various sources of same vitamin like Vitamin A comes from Spinach as well as Milk but both with different potency, therefore for medication purpose the standardization was needed and IU met the requirement.

IU is not same for all types of vitamins and only fat-soluble vitamins are measured in IU. Understand from this that 40 IU of Vitamin D is 1 Mcg where as 10 IU of Vitamin A is 3 Mcg. While buying vitamin supplements keep these in mind.

If you are Still Confused?.... then read RDA

All most all essential nutrients have RDA values also; these feature prominently on the multivitamin labels. RDA is Recommended Daily Allowance (one must not ever exceed these, unless prescribed by registered doctor). It is a standardized amount of various nutrients that is required for optimum health but varies from country to county.