I have become very iron deficient and anemic.  My hemoglobin is 9.8 and my ferritin level is 2.5.  I am weak and have been tying to get my iron back up with Bariatric Advantage chewables but this hasn't been successful.  The bottle says one pill contains 29mg of ferrous fumerate.  There are other bottles of ferrous fumerate that have 324 mg per pill.  Am I taking the wrong kind?  Does anyone have any direction to offer?   Thanks for checking in.  I'll be posting my before and after shots in the next day or two.

Hi Jill, I too, have had been very iron deficient and my surgeon sent me to a blood doctor who than started me on iron infusions.  The blood doctor said I will always need iron infusions. I have been very good at taking all my vitamins.  I never missed a dose.  The doctor said that it's because of the surgery and we can't absorb iron by mouth. Fun.  I hate those infusions.  I had to go once a week for six weeks and now I'm going back in a month to see if it's holding. It's one of the side effects that I hope we could fix. Good luck with yours. Koukla

Hi. I just went through this very situation. My levels were at 3 for my hemoglobin and ferritin was at 0. My PCP had me take 3 iron tablets a day. I took 325 mg of ferrous fumerate three times a day for 6 months. That brought my levels up to low normal which got me out of my anemic condition, but I still need to continue to get my levels up even more and especially to raise my ferritin. My PCP did this instead of having me do an iron transfusion. You may want to talk to your PCP about using one of these two methods. Having levels this low can be very serious I was told. The last piece of advice I can give is that you need to push the issue with your PCP. My blood levels had been continually declining and not one doctor said anything until I pushed the issue. So in short, you need to be your own advocate. Hope this helped.

I am too iron deficient and anemic. I had to have  4 pints of blood after my tt because my blood levels were so low.  I am now CHROMAGEN FORTE which is an iron pill that I take twice a day  Since I started taking them, I now feel so much better.  You may want to check with your doctor to see if he would prescribe the iron for you. I hope that you get to feeling better.. I do know how you are feeling.

I've struggled with similar issues this year.  While my hemoglobin and hematocrit were low end of normal my ferratin was 9 and iron binding 594.  That was enough to cause me a mild heart attack in October!!  So this isn't anything to fool around with!!!!  I did have an iron infusion to get my levels all straighted out.  I too had been taking Bariatric Advantage chewable iron since my surgery:  2 per day.  This obviously wasn't enough to keep my ferritin up- but was keeping my hemoglobin and hematocrit up at least in normal range.  So I do believe the type of iron does have something to do with it - and also I believe it depends on the individual and how your own body happens to absorb and process iron.  Not everyone is the same.  Many folks seem to do fine on just Bariatric Advantage, others, obviously need more, or a different type.  Michelle (Vitalady) has posted quite a bit about this and discussed with a chemist, I believe it was, about the formulation of her Tender Iron pills and why they work the way they do, particularly why they seem to work so well on ferritin levels.  There is some particularly scientific explanation (and a board search may turn that up), but I believe it has to do with the type of iron used in the Tender Iron (the carbonyl iron).   So I've switched to Tender Irons and I'm taking 6 of those per day at present to try and hold and maintain the levels I've achieved with the iron infusion - to hopefully avoid another infusion.  So I guess my suggestion would be to perhaps try another form of iron an/dor an infusion.  

I have read that taking vitamin C with your iron helps your body absorb it.   (Sorry if someone already mentioned that - I don't have time to read all these responses.) 

OK, your 29mg never was enough and the fe fumarate is not the best choice. 324mg is iron salts, so really only about 65mg elemental.

We start our proximals on 150mg of Tender Iron or Polysaccharride iron, both taken with vit C, but not with anything else for at least an hour. That's a good start, but iron invaroiably neefs tweaking as we go along. Age and gender have nothing to do with malabsorption.

As I said, any of the ferrous or glycinate families do not work as well as the Tender or poly types, and if you were mine, I'd have you do 150mg Tener + 150mg poly to really get going. That's 300mg ELEMENTAL iron, so would snap you up quickly.

Hey, Michelle! I wanted to ask your advice.  Here are my blood values.  I took chewable iron initially after WLS (2 at probably 29 mg).  Then switched to 2 Vitron C and took that til 1 year post-op and switched to your Tender Iron.  Been taking 8 per day with Vitamin C (by themselves) for more than a year now. I had a "bleeder" in my left breast after mastectomy in March of this year.  My doc told me to double my iron so I went up to 12 Tender Iron per day for about 6 weeks.  That helped my bring my labs back up nicely.  Doc told me to go back to my regular dosage thereafter so I went back to 8 per day. My hemoglobin and hematocrat - look decent.  My iron which dropped for the first year did rebound with the switch to Tender Iron and is now 108.  The only "concern" is my ferritin.  It is in a downward trend and has been for the last year.  Any suggestions for tweaks to get that back up before it keeps dropping? Thanks, Kathy

Hemoglobin (reference range (11.7–15.5) –

 

12/07/2004 (Consult): 13.2,

04/29/2005 (Pre-WLS): 13.2,

09/12/2005 (4 Mos. Post-Op): 12.3,

11/28/2005 (6 Mos. Post-Op): 12.3,

05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 12.8,

11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 13.1,

03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 8.9 L,

07/23/2007 (26 Mos. Post-Op): 12.4,

12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 13.6

Hematocrit (reference range 35.0-45.0) –

 

2/07/2004 (Consult): 38.0,

04/29/2005 (Pre-WLS): 39.2,

09/12/2005 (4 Mos. Post-Op): 37.4,

11/28/2005 (6 Mos. Post-Op): 36.8,

05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 37.5,

11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 37.6,

03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 26.0 L,

07/23/2007 (26 Mos. Post-Op): 37.5,

12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 39.2

Iron Values
Iron (reference range 35-175) -    08/19/2005 (3 Mos. Post-Op): 77, 11/28/2005 (6 Mos. Post-Op): 56, 05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 47, Increased iron and changed form of iron from ferrous fumerate to carbonyl iron 11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 86, 03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 69, 12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 108	Ferritin (reference range 10-232) –   08/19/2005 (3 Mos. Post-Op): 121, 11/28/2005 (6 Mos. Post-Op): 154, 05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 157, 11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 141, 03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 117, 12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 90
TIBC (reference range 250-400) –   08/19/2005 (3 Mos. Post-Op): 308, 05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 320, 11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 300, 03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 289, 12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 359
% Saturation (reference range 15-50) –   08/19/2005 (3 Mos. Post-Op): 25, 05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 15, 11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 29, 03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 24, 12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 30
UIBC (reference range 110-370) –   08/19/2005 (3 Mos. Post-Op): 231, 05/16/2006 (12 Mos. Post-Op): 273, 11/16/2006 (18 Mos. Post-Op): 214, 03/21/2007 (2 days after emergency surg): 220, 12/04/2007 (30 Mos. Post-Op): 251

 

 

 

 

Sorry I vanished. 4 spt grp parties and a staff party and I took my revision back to the airport yesterday. Whew.

I'm not a fan of the Vitron C. I carry it for the same reason I carry ADEKs. Docs recommend them, so when ppl do not get the desired results with them, they are already "here", so to speak, so I can swtich them over to the more effective products and save them a bundle of $$, too. (that paragraph is signed by the Queen of Cheap

Looks like you numbers are lovely. I want my ferritin around 200+, but even so, your 90 is quite nice.

Hi Jill, After 2.5 years of BA chewables, my ferritin was down to 7. I had read Michelle's various postings (THANK YOU, MICHELLE!!!) about Tender Iron being 'the one' to bring up ferritin. I ordered some from her, vitalady.com, and after only a month of taking them (albeit, I started taking 12 each day until I read someone's post that you should start with 6 and increase), so after taking 12 a day for a week, then 6 a day for three weeks, my ferritin level was up to 15, yippee! I worked my way to 12 by increasing 2 every 2 weeks. I think i read that Michelle takes 12 and that's going to be just fine for me. I think you rock, Michelle!!! Anyway, my blood won't be drawn again for a couple of months, but I sincerely believe that my ferritin level is increasing. I am not experiencing the extreme tiredness. Hope this helps you.