Folic Acid 5mg too much?

[GastritisB12]

Hello,

My doctor prescribed me 5mg folic acid for 4 months because my red cell folate was low 221nmol/l out of 285-1474. My serum folate was 4.9ug/L out of 4.0-19.9

By this point I had already had my 6 loading doses of B12. I also have anti-parietal antibodies I have been diagnosed with mild gastritis.

Now I came across this article where the Institute of Medicine in the USA says the limit of folic acid should be 1000mcg per day. And that extra unconverted folic acid in blood can block Folate from entering cells.

health.harvard.edu/newslett...

So I am confused now, is 5mg folic acid too much, even though BNF UK guidelines prescribe it?

Can I chop the tablets into 1/4 and still build up my Folate?

Thanks very much.

[fbirder]

Tht letter is more than 10 years old, plenty of time for those claims to have been checked out and recommendations changed if they turned out to be correct. So I wouldn't worry about it.

[GastritisB12 in reply to fbirder]

Thanks very much! I am so silly I forgot to look at the article date.

[Gambit62 Administrator]

5mg certainly isn't a dose to take for a long time on a regular basis but if you are recovering from a folate deficiency there will be some damage that needs to be repaired and that will temporarily mean that you need higher amounts of B12. As fbirder says the article is very old - I haven't signed up so couldn't read it in total - and it seems to be about long term use.

[GastritisB12 in reply to Gambit62]

Thanks very much! I am so silly I forgot to look at the article date.

[Gambit62 Administrator]

GastritisB12 - there seems to be some rubbish going on in the forum about MTHFR needing methylfolate and other forms of folate being toxic. Have deleted a response to this effect from this thread.

[GastritisB12 in reply to Gambit62]

Thanks! I read your posts about MTHFR so I ignored that post. I don't even know if I have that mutation. I'll keep taking the folic acid