Ferritin was 4, now 8 - iron supplementation, how much?

[minifingers]

Was diagnosed with very low ferritin levels a year ago and recommended to take 3 x ferrous sulphate a day by GP. Did it for a short while and then gave up as it was making me unwell (horrible squits, sorry tmi). Had my blood checked again and despite only VERY sporadic supplementation with Floradix/Spatone, it had gone up from 4 to 8, but I'm still cream crackered. Started on Ferrous fumerate and seem to be doing a bit better than with ferrous sulphate, but wondering if I still need to take 3 a day. Seems a lot, particularly as my ferritin levels have gone up. I'm not anaemic - it's just iron storage, not iron levels in my blood that are a problem.

Does anyone else have this - low ferritin, but normal blood iron? What do you take?

It is quite common to have low ferritin, but normal haemoglobin. The problem comes if there is a call on the haemoglobin, then you will need your ferritin and if it's not there, it can be very serious.

Your ferritin level needs to be at least 70 and preferably 100, so you have a way to go yet and it will need to be a lot higher than it is before your symptoms start to go.

If you can take 3 ferrous fumarate a day do, and make sure you get tested every three months or so to make sure your levels are still going up. If they are not, you would need to talk to your GP about other methods of raising them.

It took me four years to raise mine from 16 to 100, but it has been worth it.

rockin what exactly did you take and how much each day?

Thanks Rockin. That's what I suspected.

I'm the same (ferritin 7 at last check and haemoglobin I think was just under 11?) and my GP has me on 2x ferrous fumarate per day at the moment. I've been on it for maybe 6 weeks this time but don't feel any benefit yet

Me too! My Ferritin was 5 and haemoglobin was 10. I have felt totally exhausted for months! I couldn't tolerate 3 ferrous fumerate so have dropped it down to 2. I have been taking them for a couple of months now and I don't feel much better either! I'm supposed to be going back to check my levels, but they haven't called me in yet!

I took three ferrous gluconate a day so 900mg in total and my ferritin went from 2 to 21 in a month. Now that was a rough month and lot of time on the loo. But worth is to feel better. At 2 I was barely human.

Mine was also 2 (and hb 8) when I first found out I had a problem. Didn't even feel human! So compared to then I'm full of the joys of spring

Could your GP refer you for an iron infusion? This happened to me this year. It's made a massive improvement.