HELP! with revised vitamin regimen! Vitalady?

 Hi-- 3 yrs out here, just had 2nd hernia repair (with a bit of tightening up--! Love you Doc G) Anyway, I have NEVER understood my labs, no matter how hard I try.   

I am now anemic, and I needed to get 2 iron infusions before he would do another surgery. I am reading here, that once you are anemic, and the iron is SO low, that oral supplements are just a WASTE of money???? Is this true??? I mean, should I just stop them altogether? I was taking Proferrin ES for 2 years but the iron still just dropped. Then the iron doc told me to take Ferrous Sulfate tabs, 325, 3 times a say with peri-colace. Will this bring up my iron even though it is still low?  

Would Vitalady's Tender Iron work better? Or not at all?  

Also, my calcium is low. I try to take those damed horse pills 3-4 times a day too, but NOT in conjunction with the iron! Its getting very confusing, and I need to try to make myself a stricter schedule that will WORK.  

I looked at Vitalady's schedule, and I am not taking the Vitamin C. Why is this needed? For absorption?  

Sorry guys, please help!                                         

 2010                      2009
IRON TOTAL                16L                         24L
IRON BINDING             387                        317
IRON % SATUR             4L                         8L  
PARATHYROID  HORMONE, INTACT     85 (H)                 73 (H)

Vit C is not needed with Proferrin, just other irons. How many Proferrin were you taking per day? Were you breaking them in half (recommended since it;s unlikely our alterred stomachs can break through the coating)?

Also, your PTH is HIGH, which is BAD and has to do with calcium, not iron. How much calcium do you take daily and how much per dose? What kind? What is your vit D level?

Was taking 2 proferrin a day, broken in half.
I take 3-4 doses of Citracal w/ Vit D (2 pills=1260mg each dose).
My vit D TOTAL is low at 19L but Doc G gave me prescrip Vit D I am taking.

we need to talk. pm me your phone number and i will call.
gina

saves me a lot of typing, but I'll put a lil in here for lurkers

rx vit D, no. D2 in oil not absorbable. we do D3 water soluble, dry

fe sulfate is not really 325, it's about 65mg and without C it's nothing at all, and for US, it's also nothing. So, you can add C, but you end up taking a lot of pills for nothing.

The Proferrin might not have been enough dose. Hard to say. It doesn't like vit C.

PTH goes with vit D (which is not being helped) and calcium. Need to practice your label reading skills, as I did. Nearly everyone gets caught on this. 2 pills = 630. So, you're taking half what you think you are. Makes it look like you're taking mega doses of calc and D, but in fact, your body can't see much of any of it. The PTH is the messenger screaming for help, but the wrong people are hearing the screams.

Is Tender Iron better? For some ppl, it is magic. I've always used it, iron around 100, ferritin around 300, years 'n years. My husband the same.

Once infused, always infused? Not necessarily. Since docs often say this because they tried fe sulate and it didn't work or low doses of other ferrous forms. Wrong trial, wrong conclusion. It means you don't absorb THOSE. Or that 29mg isn't enough and you need 290 mg.

So, pretty much, you can try your way thru the orals while you're doing infusions and see which one starts to buy you more time between infusions. Case in point, one of my BFF, with RNY like mine, very distal. Ferriti9n was 9 pre-op, not that anyone actually LOOKED at it, for a coupla years. She was on iron SHOTS weekly for years. I wanted to her to be my guinea pig. She took 150mg Tender, 150mg poly with C, daily. Even with shots. The shots got further apart and then one day, here ferritin reached 437 a full year after her last shot. Her numbers remain much like mine.

So, some times you have to date a lot of irons and sizes before you find the perfect fit. While lots of people don't mind the infusions, some have reactions, some find their copay unmanageable or lose their insurance. I so prefer ppl to be trying the different irons while they can and watch their own results.

Thanks, Michelle. I was responding from my cell phone and couldn't type the details, but we did talk on the phone and I thin****pt to the VitaLady guidelines as you've stated above. If you felt someone doing a Vulcan mind meld on you yesterday, it was me. 

I hope you and Don are doing better.

--gina
 

LOL!


Yesterday I had to be Michelle all day, so Vitalady was not in use. LOL

Had to be Michelle more than Vitalady all weeek, but had to be Vitalady all day today.

Tomorrow I am a vegetable.

Don't want to be the bearer of bad news, but prescription vit D is not very absorbable by us DSers.  That's why we have to take a dry D3, and I get mine through Vitalady.

I hope others are along shortly to help you with your other questions.  This vitamine stuff is tough.

Charrie

 Take MajorMom up on her offer of a phone convo.  She will get you right as rain :)

I am in your shoes and a bit ahead I think.  Today I had more labs taken.  I have been on the vitalady tender iron for the last 3 weeks.  I will tell you if I have any changes in my labs as soon as my doctor calls me with the results.  BTW--I am 5 years out and have taken vita4life vitamins with iron 12 a day and still severely anemic.  With the tender irons and all this crap about iron I have found this to be my understanding:

iron fumerate  or glycinate (sucks causes less constipation but not that well absorbed)
iron carbonyl absorbs really well and causes constipation

Vitamin C should be taken with the iron or just before so that the tummy is nice and acidic and you absorb the iron better.  If you were not taking iron on an empty stomach with vitamin C do that from now on and it should be better. 

Today my doctor told me to double my iron dose so now not just once in the am do I take 5 pills but I also take 5 more in the afternoon. I tried doing that on my own given my symptoms and the scary stuff I was experiencing / FATIGUE and dizzy---and found that taking it past 4pm makes me stay awake at night.  So I take it am and 3pm no later.  I stay away from food 2 hours prior so my tummy is a bit empty and I swallow the C first and then take all 5 in one swish. 
I have ordered a liquid iron supplement I found called Floradix--not sure if anyone has heard of it or used it??  They claim to absorb 25% better than the pills?? My doctor said she has other patients (she is a PCP) that  are taking 16 pills of iron a day and they see their labs just barely go up.  I read that we absorb only 1mg of iron a day and that means it doesn't restore itself that quickly. :(

We'll get through this don't worry.  Key lab info to know with anemia are the following and add if I forget something, I am experiencing this so I am telling you what I know (and it's far from everything or I wouldn't be in these shoes too):

Iron and TIBC
Ferritin
Transferrin
Zinc
Copper
CBC with plates diff

I hope that Marine Wife and ebeanygirl chime in to help!  They're dynamite!