Study: diet of dark green leafy vegetables reduces ferritin

[Autumn_Leaves]

Reduction in Ferritin Concentrations among Patients Consuming a Dark-Green Leafy Vegetable–Rich, Low Inflammatory Foods Everyday (LIFE) Diet

doi.org/10.1093/cdn/nzac095

From my own experience, I believe that a whole food plant based dietary pattern is effective in keeping my ferritin levels low.

The LIFE diet was for a group of patients taking part in a specific study. It’s not dietary advice for haemachromatosis patients. It would probably be difficult to sustain in the long term but I believe it is possible to incorporate elements of the LIFE diet into someone’s habitual diet if they are more inclined towards a plant based diet.

I was impressed that the “adherent” patients reduced their ferritin levels by 45.5% whereas the “non-adherent” patients’ ferritin levels increased slightly.

Diet can’t replace venesections and this post is NOT advocating it can all be done with diet. We absolutely must have our regular blood tests and have venesections to keep our levels down.

[radd]

Autumn_Leaves,

Polyphenols is the buzz word in our house 😁, but I always thought dark green leafy veg contain iron (amongst many other nutrients) so interesting to read it not only chelates iron but helps reduce inflammation, so encouraging better iron pathways whilst reducing oxidative stress.

Interesting paper. Thank you for posting.

[Autumn_Leaves in reply to radd]

The iron in leafy greens like spinach is very poorly absorbed so I don’t restrict my green veg for this reason.

[LaceyLady]

Those with thyroid issues have to be careful about consuming lots of cruciferous veggies

[Autumn_Leaves in reply to LaceyLady]

The post provided a link to a study which investigated whether the consumption of certain foods can have an impact on the absorption of iron, and whether this is pertinent to people with iron overload disorder.

It was provided for information and educational purposes only. It is not a dietary recommendation for people with haemochromatosis nor is there any suggestion that any diet can replace regular blood tests or venesections. People can take whatever they find useful from the study if they are motivated to do so, or disregard some or all of it. As I said, it’s not a dietary recommendation. It’s a study looking into one specific outcome.