I have to get my iron levels up.. I have one perscription from my GP for 305 mg Caps Ferrous fumurate (but when I go to the pharmacies here they only have Galfer which has sooo many horrible ingredients, some of which have been banned in Australia, some euro countries)... And my private Endo gave me perscritpion for 210 mg Ferrous Fumurate.
Does anyone have any recommendations for ferrous fumurate of these dosages that DO NOT contain any nasties (I even saw one brand containing talc and paraffin).
I have been taking Terra Nova Easy Iron Complex (from health store) but it is only 20mgs bisglcinate chellate... so not enough .. And I kow the drill of having iron with vit c and avoiding caffeine etc...
if anyone can recommend somehting good (and hopefully clean) that really boosted their ferritin levels, would welcome it..
C
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ChristinaMay
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A fair few on here, myself included, have had good success with Three Arrows Simply heme, a form of heme iron (derived from food sources). It's more or less like having lots of liver but without actually having to eat liver. It's pulled my ferritin up from 25 to 82 in 4 months, and is much better tolerated than synthetic ferrous forms. I can't tolerate any other oral iron because my gut just rejects them or get bad side effects.
I would see if your GP can prescribe a brand on the prescription, as I have found my ferritin levels have most improved on these when I add a timed realise vitamin c supplement of 1000mcg to it. Having them with just a good quality orange juice with a high vitamin c content did not make much difference to my ferritin levels, in fact, my levels improved more slowly compared to self supplementation without the added vitamin c.
So whatever you are able to use, a decent amount of vitamin c that doesn’t cause stomach upset is best.
This is a summary of what I have read up and found out about iron supplements over the past few years. I am not in any way medically trained. You are strongly encouraged to check every detail before making any decisions for yourself.
I think this is where I got mine from. The 305s seem to be capsules so have extra ingredients, the 210s, which I bought, don’t have many fillers. Mine was self treated as my iron levels used to drop quite quickly, rather than doc prescribed.
I take ferris fumerate 210mcg for my low ferritin. I guess there’s nothing better than eating foods high in ferritin however, I’m a vegetarian and not eaten meat in decades. I find ferris fumerate really works and keeps my levels optimal. I normally take a tablet with my evening meal. But I don’t do it every day as prescribed. I do it daily for a week then take a weeks break as too much can upset my stomach.
Since you live in the UK you are not legally restricted to taking the iron supplements your doctor is prescribing, you have a surprising amount of choice. You can buy the same iron tablets doctors prescribe from pharmacies without a prescription. But a lot of people struggle to tolerate iron salts like ferrous fumarate. Iron absorption isn't improved by just ramping up the dose. In fact higher doses can actually slow down absorption in some people. The reasons behind this are discussed in this thread :
When I was taking iron tablets for a very long time I was buying ferrous fumarate 210mg without prescription at pharmacies. Each tablet contained 69mg of pure iron. The only way I could tolerate them was by taking them with food. (The 305s you are taking contain 100mg iron per tablet.)
I wrote this reply to another member several years ago :
Since I wrote the above reply the market for haem/ferritin supplements in the UK has widened slightly, compared to what used to be available, and several members of the forum have succeeded in raising their ferritin levels much more quickly with those than they could with iron salts.
If your iron and ferritin are very low and you absorb iron very poorly then you might be able to persuade a doctor to refer you for an iron infusion. Some people pay for a private infusion. If I had my time over again I would try haem/ferritin supplements, and if they didn't work I would get an iron infusion because it took me so long to raise my ferritin and serum iron with tablets.
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