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In order to raise my ferritin level I was told to take a daily iron supplement and eat more red meat. Prior to this I did not take an iron supplement. After taking a daily iron supplement for two months and modestly increasing meat and fish oil consumption my ferritin level remains absolutely unchanged. What could be the cause of this?
I had to take 2-325mg tablets daily of ferrous sulfate for a few months for mine to go up. But of course I did that under Dr’s supervision. Now that it is up I am on a lower maintenance dose.
So there’s no confusion, I think the important quantity is the “elemental” iron involved. I assume you weren’t taking 325mg of elemental iron. I have two iron supplements in front of me. They both have 18 mgs of elemental iron but one is from 90 mgs of “Iron Amino Acid Chelate” and the other is from 360mg Iron Protein Succinylate. As both claim to be 100% of the daily requirement, if one was taking 325mg of elemental iron it would be nearly 18x the daily requirement and two tablets would be 36x!
You might try UNILIVER. Its desicated liver thats high in iron. Its a safer way to take iron than iron supps. Or you could just eat liver everyday .Yuk! I take 20 liver tabs a day. You can also get it in a powder.
I’ve tried several brands and forms… the best for me has been feosol. I went from 20’s to 100’s in 6 months.
@Gardiner 2734 wrote:
So there’s no confusion, I think the important quantity is the “elemental” iron involved. I assume you weren’t taking 325mg of elemental iron. I have two iron supplements in front of me. They both have 18 mgs of elemental iron but one is from 90 mgs of “Iron Amino Acid Chelate” and the other is from 360mg Iron Protein Succinylate. As both claim to be 100% of the daily requirement, if one was taking 325mg of elemental iron it would be nearly 18x the daily requirement and two tablets would be 36x!
Good clarification. My bottle says “Ferrous Sulfate 325 mg (5gr)” and on the back”65mg of elemental iron”.
@Gardiner 2730 wrote:
In order to raise my ferritin level I was told to take a daily iron supplement and eat more red meat. Prior to this I did not take an iron supplement. After taking a daily iron supplement for two months and modestly increasing meat and fish oil consumption my ferritin level remains absolutely unchanged. What could be the cause of this?
Iron comes in several forms. Commonly available supplement forms are:
1. Ferrous iron – the most common form in supplements
2. Heme iron – the form of iron in bloodHeme iron is very well absorbed. It is available in more expensive and harder to obtain supplements. It is the form in red meat.
Ferrous iron needs an acidic environment to be soluble. Otherwise, it can turn into the Ferric form, which is insoluble and not absorbed.
To improve ferrous iron absorption, one can stabilize the ferrous form by taking it with Vitamin C. Vitamin C can bind to the ferrous form of iron. The two can then be moved to the small intestine where the iron can be absorbed before it can change to the ferric form.
Taking iron with food which contains meat with fat also helps absorption by increasing acidity.
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