Accessing and Understanding DRI Tables

To access the DRI tables through the eBook, from the homepage in Canvas, you'll want to click on McGraw-Hill Connect. Once you're in McGraw-Hill Connect, your screen should look like this one, and you'll want to click on the eBook. You can find this on the left-hand side of the screen under Read. Click on the eBook. and mine are already set to the DRIs, but yours likely won't be. So to access them, you click on these table of contents, three lines, and you'll want to scroll down to where it says appendix, open this up, and click on appendix G, and then you'll see the DRI tables. So let me walk you through how these tables are set up. So you'll see there's the dietary reference intakes for DRI, and these are looking at recommended intakes for individuals'vitamins. Remember, these levels here are going to be in RDA or AI units. Let's see if they give us that at the bottom. Let's see. How they've done it is anything that's bolded is an RDA, and anything that's not bolded is an AI. You can see vitamin K is an AI and vitamin C for some age groups. but then older age groups, it's bolded, so this is an RDA. Vitamin D has an RDA, and so forth. And what is important for you to remember is that these numbers that are in this table are those that are going to be safe and adequate for most individuals. Now remember, the bolded ones, the RDA, are meeting 97% to 98% of the population's needs, whereas AIs are based on the best scientific estimates we can create based on the literature. What else I want to point out here is here are the nutrients across the top. Notice that some of them are milligrams, and then some of them are going to be in micrograms. Let me see if I can find one. Here we go, some micrograms. Remember, micrograms are much smaller than milligrams. Another thing I want you to notice is that this is broken out by life stage. So infants, children, and gender, male, female. And then also, if someone is pregnant or they're lactating, they have special requirements for some nutrients. So what you'd want to do is... figure out if we let's say we have a 21 year old male and you want to know what their vitamin c recommendation is well here's males 19 to 30 years of age vitamin c is 90 milligrams a day is what's recommended uh or the recommended dietary allowance or rda so essentially there's a table for vitamins there's a similar table here's one for for minerals or they're calling them elements, but these are minerals. And then there also is a table of, let's see, macronutrients. You don't need to worry about that. I want to find the ULs. Let's see, electrolytes and water. There's the acceptable macronutrient distribution ranges. Here we go. Here's the ULs. So vitamins, you can see. So for instance, we were looking at vitamin C before, and if we go back up, you can see it was 90, probably remember it was 90 milligrams for a male 21 years of age. Now if we look down at the UL, what is a UL for vitamin C with that same age group? Well, in that age group, it's 2,000 milligrams. So 90 is a safe and adequate amount to meet 97, 98% of the population's needs, and 2,000 is the upper level, meaning that if a... a person consistently consumed over 2,000 milligrams a day of vitamin C, they may start seeing toxicity symptoms. And that is, we're looking at males that are 21 years of age. So there's also a UL table for elements or minerals. So these are what you need to be able to use if given information that you're able to identify what the recommendations would be for an individual using vitamins and minerals. charts for the RDA and AIs, or to think about whether or not an amount is too high to go above the UL. Another thing I'd mention is notice that some of these, I just noticed that some of these, you have to scroll over to be able to see all of the nutrients. So they have not put it so that it fits on one page, just to keep a note of that as well. If you have any further questions about navigating the DRI tables, don't hesitate to ask me or the TAs, and remember you're going to have practice being able to use this where I think those numbers will gain a little bit more meaning to you than what was just shown in this video.

So to access them, you click on these table of contents, three lines, and you'll want to scroll down to where it says appendix, open this up, and click on appendix G, and then you'll see the DRI tables. So let me walk you through how these tables are set up. So you'll see there's the dietary reference intakes for DRI, and these are looking at recommended intakes for individuals'vitamins.

Remember, these levels here are going to be in RDA or AI units. Let's see if they give us that at the bottom. Let's see.

How they've done it is anything that's bolded is an RDA, and anything that's not bolded is an AI. You can see vitamin K is an AI and vitamin C for some age groups. but then older age groups, it's bolded, so this is an RDA. Vitamin D has an RDA, and so forth.

And what is important for you to remember is that these numbers that are in this table are those that are going to be safe and adequate for most individuals. Now remember, the bolded ones, the RDA, are meeting 97% to 98% of the population's needs, whereas AIs are based on the best scientific estimates we can create based on the literature. What else I want to point out here is here are the nutrients across the top.

Notice that some of them are milligrams, and then some of them are going to be in micrograms. Let me see if I can find one. Here we go, some micrograms.

Remember, micrograms are much smaller than milligrams. Another thing I want you to notice is that this is broken out by life stage. So infants, children, and gender, male, female. And then also, if someone is pregnant or they're lactating, they have special requirements for some nutrients. So what you'd want to do is...

figure out if we let's say we have a 21 year old male and you want to know what their vitamin c recommendation is well here's males 19 to 30 years of age vitamin c is 90 milligrams a day is what's recommended uh or the recommended dietary allowance or rda so essentially there's a table for vitamins there's a similar table here's one for for minerals or they're calling them elements, but these are minerals. And then there also is a table of, let's see, macronutrients. You don't need to worry about that.

I want to find the ULs. Let's see, electrolytes and water. There's the acceptable macronutrient distribution ranges. Here we go.

Here's the ULs. So vitamins, you can see. So for instance, we were looking at vitamin C before, and if we go back up, you can see it was 90, probably remember it was 90 milligrams for a male 21 years of age.

Now if we look down at the UL, what is a UL for vitamin C with that same age group? Well, in that age group, it's 2,000 milligrams. So 90 is a safe and adequate amount to meet 97, 98% of the population's needs, and 2,000 is the upper level, meaning that if a... a person consistently consumed over 2,000 milligrams a day of vitamin C, they may start seeing toxicity symptoms. And that is, we're looking at males that are 21 years of age.

So there's also a UL table for elements or minerals. So these are what you need to be able to use if given information that you're able to identify what the recommendations would be for an individual using vitamins and minerals. charts for the RDA and AIs, or to think about whether or not an amount is too high to go above the UL.

Another thing I'd mention is notice that some of these, I just noticed that some of these, you have to scroll over to be able to see all of the nutrients. So they have not put it so that it fits on one page, just to keep a note of that as well. If you have any further questions about navigating the DRI tables, don't hesitate to ask me or the TAs, and remember you're going to have practice being able to use this where I think those numbers will gain a little bit more meaning to you than what was just shown in this video.

Transcript for:Accessing and Understanding DRI Tables

Transcript for:
Accessing and Understanding DRI Tables