Quality of food and nutrition has been on the decline in general. We are eating more fast foods than ever before and suffer from more nutritional deficiencies than in the past. No wonder, health supplements have become a regular part of our lives. There are hundreds of brands of these products which offer vitamin, mineral and antioxidant supplements for children as well as adults.

Since there are a number of such supplements, it becomes difficult to choose because all seem similar and claim the same benefits. Verification and assurance of quality are difficult to obtain. Pharmaceutical grade supplements can offer a solution to this issue. But before that, let me expose some troubles with supplements.

Herring, salmon, mackerel and other cold water fish are a rich source of fish oil and fatty acids. Oil is extracted and refined before being offered as a fish oil supplement. These fish are known to contain traces of cadmium, arsenic and nickel which cause heavy metal poisoning in humans. The refining processes are strong enough to remove these poisons but the essential fatty acids also get removed, reducing the quality of the supplement.

Supplements differ in the way they are absorbed in the digestive process. To take an example, a tablet might say that it contains 30mg of a vitamin but when only 6mg gets absorbed; the rest is eliminated as waste. So the effectiveness is only 20%. You will then need 5 tablets to cover your requirements.

Vitamins do not work in isolation. They work along with other minerals and enzymes. Natural food contains the right amounts of nutrients which makes it easier for the body to process them. However, artificially made vitamins are isolated elements and are therefore not effective.

Supplements differ in the way they are manufactured, transported and stored. FDA classifies all supplements as either animal grade, food grade or US pharmaceutical grade supplements. The United States Pharmocepia (USP) is an authority on setting standards for health products. To classify as a pharmaceutical grade supplements, two conditions must be fulfilled.

The first criterion is high bioavailability, which implies that the constituent nutrients are absorbed by the body to a large extent with minimum wastage. The second criterion is the absence of fillers and binders used in the products but hinder the process of absorption. This is also known as purity of the product. Pharmaceutical grade products are required to be ninety nine percent pure.

Usana Health Sciences is the number one producer of health supplements in the country. All Usana products are certified by USP for purity and bioavailability.