Can't make sense of my iron blood results?

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These are my most recent iron blood results and I just can't make sense of them. Will I benefit from iron supplementation or no? The GP just said "take them if you want" and I didn't find that very helpful at all.

Here are my results:-

Iron - 12 umol/L

Transferrin - 3.7 H g/l

TIBC - 93 H umol/L

Trans Sat - 13 L

Ferritin - 32 ug/L

Thank you 😊

0 likes, 3 replies

3 Replies

  • Posted

    (Thank you for the units at each parameter!

    We usually also need the reference range of lab as they can -depending on methond- be different and see on which end numbers were dangling even if normal or out of range, so see by how much, how severely. With iron and FBC though the differences are not as severe usually.)

    Your Transferrin goes hand in hand with Total Iron Binding Capacity - on the high end -

    and it seems your body is hungry for iron,

    BUT

    your transferrin is saturated 13% with iron.

    In females a saturation (as iron is toxic, it needs to be bound to a protein) range isย 12โ€“45%.

    So not too bad, especially since more transferrin is available (%dilution effect for existing iron)

    It does not look like being on lower end of iron, but not being a classic iron deficiency,

    are you by any chance pregnant or taking the contraceptive pill?

    This (more transferrin, more TIBC) is a common finding, that more transferrin is produced (by liver), which is even with normal iron levels of course not as saturated, purely mathematically without iron deficiency or iron anemia.

    A red blood cell count/parameters would be helpful, too to see if an iron anemia was going on or not. (= red cells small, hemoglobin per red cell and in total low)

    That would determine the supplement iron and in which dose so much better.

    If you are not taking the pill or are pregnant, so that explanation falling for higher transferrin/TIBC,

    I personally would keep iron rich foods with VitC up or better than before,

    but surely no drastic iron intake, just a bit support. Maybe some gentle low dose supplement.

    Bit more than intake was before.

    Then it should be fine without running into an iron overdose risk. Ferritin has quite some space still, too for binding excess iron.

    so yes, I would brush up a bit on iron, but not be worried.

    All the best!

    Pity your doc did not say explicitely how much for how long.

    • Posted

      Ah, I wish I could edit.

      Method, not methond, duh,

      but:

      "It does look like being on lower end of iron, but not being a classic iron deficiency",

      there was a 'not' in there. grhmpf. 

  • Posted

    What Sonya said except that some people with low ferritin levels have iron deficiency anaemia symptoms like thinning hair, tiredness, small blood cells. If you have tirednes symptoms I would rediscuss with your doctor as I think you could benefit.

    But it also depends on why your iron stores (ferritin) are low. Have you tested your b12 or folate? Are you a vegetarian?ย 

    If you do decide to supplement try to agree with your doctor the dosage and when you will be retested.

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