Salts and potency

[kaosisallwesee]

Hey everyone, first post and I know its a basic one, but I've got a question I hope you can help me with.

Is the weight of the salt taken into account when labelling pharmaceuticals? For example, if the packaging states "Drug X Phosphate 50mg"  does that include the weight of the phosphate salt? I started thinking about Hemihydrates and how little they weigh compared to bulkier salts like phosphates and sulphates, so I assumed it must be taken into account when dosing drugs as some are more potent by weight than others...... but I actually have no idea.

Thanks for any help guys.

[StringJunky]

1 hour ago, kaosisallwesee said:

Hey everyone, first post and I know its a basic one, but I've got a question I hope you can help me with.

Is the weight of the salt taken into account when labelling pharmaceuticals? For example, if the packaging states "Drug X Phosphate 50mg"  does that include the weight of the phosphate salt? I started thinking about Hemihydrates and how little they weigh compared to bulkier salts like phosphates and sulphates, so I assumed it must be taken into account when dosing drugs as some are more potent by weight than others...... but I actually have no idea.

Thanks for any help guys.

I think it depends if the whole compound is the active ingredient. If not, they usually state the amount of the active ingredient as well. For example, if you were taking zinc tablets in the form of zinc citrate, it might say "50mg zinc citrate tablets, of which 15mg is zinc". You are interested in the amount of active ingredient which is the zinc and base your dosage on that..

Edited September 4, 2018 by StringJunky