Hands up if you often feel sapped of energy or lacking focus? While it’s easy to brush off niggling health symptoms as being part and parcel of a busy modern life, they could be indicators of iron deficiency.
Low iron levels can deplete your energy, cause dizziness and sap concentration, as well as trigger a whole host of other surprising symptoms.
Iron deficiency can especially affect women during menstruation, during pregnancy and after giving birth, particularly if you have other health conditions, such as chronic heart failure.
Read on for the warning signs to watch out for, and what you can do about it.
Why you need iron
Iron is an essential nutrient, which you can get from eating iron-rich foods, as well as from supplements, from oral iron and iron infusions if your doctor recommends that you need them.
Iron helps you function normally and is needed to make haemoglobin, a substance present in all red blood cells, which carries oxygen throughout your body. Without enough iron, you may not have enough oxygen circulating, so you may feel constantly tired.
Iron also helps to keep your immune system healthy, so your body can fight off infections.
Signs you might have iron deficiency
Often symptoms can creep up on sufferers without them realising or taking them seriously. Like tiredness, which nowadays is often considered just a side effect of our busy lives.
However, some symptoms shouldn’t be ignored, with tiredness, dizziness, feeling faint and shortness of breath all classic signs that you might be iron deficient. There are also some surprising symptoms and weird things that can happen to your body when you’re not getting enough iron.
Common warning signs to watch out for:
• Fatigue
• Shortness of breath
• Dizziness
• Poor memory and concentration
• Hair loss
• Pale skin
• Restless leg syndrome
• Feeling cold
• Headaches
• Brittle nails
If you are already being treated for another condition, such as chronic heart failure, having an iron deficiency might exacerbate the condition.
“Chronic heart failure makes people feel tired, they often feel breathless, get swollen ankles or distended tummy, and maybe some palpitations. Fatigue and breathlessness are often made much worse if the iron is low as well,” says Assoc. Prof. John Amerena, consultant cardiologist at University Hospital Geelong.
Causes of iron deficiency
Sometimes your need for iron might outstrip your supply. You may not be eating enough iron-rich foods, or occasionally your body just doesn’t absorb the iron in your diet properly, which causes your body’s stores to become depleted.
Iron deficiency often occurs in pregnant women, women with heavy periods, and people who donate blood often – the loss of blood equals a loss of iron.
Heavy periods can cause iron deficiency, and during menstruation, women may need up to double the iron in their diets compared to men.(1)
Those with underlying health conditions that affect how well they absorb iron are also adversely affected.
For example, about 50% of chronic heart failure patients have some form of iron deficiency, with and without anaemia.(2,3)
“The heart failure patient doesn’t absorb iron as well as they should, and so their level drops and they can then become anaemic,” explains Assoc. Prof. Amerena.
Seeking medical help
If you’ve checked off many of the symptoms above, it may be time to see your doctor or treating specialist. They can run a quick and simple blood test to find out if your iron levels are healthy.
And don’t be tempted to wander down the supplement aisle before you confirm a deficiency – while iron supplements are available without prescription, self-diagnosis isn’t recommended, as having too much iron in the body can be toxic.
How can you fix iron deficiency?
Treatment depends on the underlying cause of the deficiency, and other factors, such as how well you absorb iron from your foods. Treatment of iron deficiency can be either a therapeutic oral iron supplement or an intravenous iron infusion.
“We know that people who have weakened hearts don’t absorb iron as well as they should. Often their iron levels will drop, and we know that by replacing them, even if they are not anaemic, they will feel better,” says Assoc. Prof. Amerena.
“We try to detect the low iron level and top it up to make them feel better and keep them out of hospital, but also to prevent them getting anaemia, which can only make them feel worse,” says Assoc. Prof. Amerena.
In patients with chronic heart failure, this “topping up” is preferably by iron infusion rather than tablets.
“With heart failure we have come to recognise that it is an absorption problem, so oral tablets don’t work particularly well, and so we are recommending intravenous iron as we know that it gets into the system quickly, and boosts up the levels quickly,” explains Assoc. Prof. Amerena.
If you have iron deficiency but don’t have an absorption problem, other changes you can make yourself include eating more iron-rich foods, such as green leafy vegetables, red meat, pulses and dried fruit, as well as oral iron supplementation.
Can iron deficiency be prevented?
Monitoring iron levels with routine blood tests (every time you see your treating doctor for heart failure patients, and once a year for others) and keeping your iron levels at healthy ranges should ensure you don’t become iron deficient.
“Often in the heart failure world we’ll give the infusion every six-to-12 months. So it is an ongoing issue rather than just a once-off cure,” explains Assoc. Prof. Amerena.
“The main message is that iron deficiency is common and it’s easily fixable,” he clarifies.
Brought to you by CSL Vifor.
Iron Deficiency Day is on November 26. To find out more, visit: takeironseriously.com/au
REFERENCES
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Zimmermann M, Hurrell R. Nutritional iron deficiency. Lancet. 2007;370:511-520. Available at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140673607612355.
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Ebner N, von Haehling S. Iron deficiency in heart failure: a practical guide. Nutrients. 2013;5(9):3730-9. doi:10.3390/nu5093730. (From https://www.takeironseriously.com/chronic-heart-failure)
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Klip IT, Comin-Colet J, Voors A a, et al. Iron deficiency in chronic heart failure: an international pooled analysis. Am Heart J. 2013;165(4):575-582.e3. doi:10.1016/j.ahj.2013.01.017. (From https://www.takeironseriously.com/chronic-heart-failure)
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