Iron levels. Any GPS on here please? Or anyone else that might know.

[Ironironiron]

Does anyone know if an iron level of 30 should be considered low for a 19 year old man please?
And if so, what action or recommendations should be taken as a GP.
Or if anyone has been in a similar situation, what did the GP do please?
Current GP saying it isn't low.
Many thanks.

depends on what you mean by iron. Is it really iron or ferritin? And if it is iron, what are the units of measurement? The results also would need to be put into the clinical context of symptoms and the rest of the blood results (including any old results).

Greybeardy. As in the results of a standard GP blood test which the GP said was 30? I don't know which one just that it was standard.

Most probably checking for anaemia as main symptom is tiredness?

Thinking about it as he is usually measured in 100's, I guess it must be ferritin? In which case isn't 30 quite low?

A ferritin level of 30ug/L is the bottom end of the ‘normal’ reference range but a lot of people will be symptomatic at that level. To receive a diagnosis of iron deficient anaemia, you need a level of 15ug/L or below.

That makes sense but although not a diagnosis of anaemia surely the GP should be prescribing some in tablets or recommending to take them? He's just been sent away without anything and no suggestions as to what to next.

Because the recorded level is within the normal range they wouldn’t proactively offer supplementation. For context, my ferritin has been in single figures for at least 18 months with the lowest recorded level being 6ug/L in the summer (most recent repeat bloods it was 8ug/L) and I’ve only just been prescribed iron supplements now as I’m due to have surgery.

OK thanks for that. Maybe I need to start a new thread asking for ideas to to what else could be causing his tiredness. The GP really isn't taking it seriously and he's exhausted most of the time.

My ferritin level was 29 after I asked for blood test due to significant hair loss and constant tiredness.

I've been prescribed iron tablets & to come back in 8 weeks to be re-tested.

I would go back to the gp (e-consult?) And ask for next steps as he is still extremely tired all the time and needs further tests and/or advice

you (or he) need to find out what test it actually is that they were referring to.

whether he's anaemic or not is not something you can tell from either the iron level or the ferritin - anaemia is suggested by the haemoglobin level. If he's anaemic then the rest of the full blood count and the haematinics will give pointers to the cause, and one of those causes may be iron deficiency.

If his ferritin is 30 then that suggests iron deficiency, but it needs interpreting with the rest of the results because there are other things that can affect ferritin. If it's his iron level that's 30 then you need to know the units of measurement because that could be normal or could be abnormal.

Iron deficiency is much less common in people who don't menstruate so if it turns out that he is deficient that may need some more investigations (although if he's not anaemic/there's another obvious cause then starting off by supplementing and assessing the result may be appropriate).

Bottom line is that if you/he are not sure what the test result actually was or don't really understand/believe the explanation you should probably go back to someone who has access to the whole set of results and can put them in context properly.