Third trimester blood panel / very worried / folate iron

[Lolly127]

Hi all ,
severely anxious . Got my third blood panel result iton still low at 99 which I was aware of and been on tablets for 3 weeks , only a slight increase so far . What concerns me is I have identified I’ve got low hb on all yet my mass cell volume is in the 90s . Now I’ve established this trend myself and Googled and I’m thinking I’m low on folate ans so my child could be still born , unwell or something . But they haven’t checked my folic acid and this appears the trend from 12 weeks.

I had this and I was also worried about bleeding a lot during my third section

I had two iron transfusions and an injection probably of b12 I think?

It didn't keep my levels for more than 20 days to be honest

I had a section with similar bleeding to my other two a bit more it was my third section I think around 1litre?

Call maternity and say you're exhausted go in and have some monitoring
Are you having growth scans?
When you see the OB ask them to prescribe you an iron infusion as it's very hard to absorb it in your gut

Sending love

I’m on iron already but I’m worried I’ve got low b12 or folate with the other reading being hogh ? But the midwife hasn’t mentioned or flagged this ? I’m unsure why they aren’t checking those levels as with my research it’s an indication apparently

But what is their cut off for a transfusion?

You need to make sure you see a consultant not just the midwife as she can't prescribe the iron
It has to be calculated for your weight and then prescribed and in my trust they don't do it in maternity they do the transfusion in day care
I can't have oral iron I get completely sick from it it's impossible

Oral iron much harder to absorb compared to a transfusion

Your plasma almost doubles when pregnant so a lower concentration of the iron is expected but I can't remember the threshold I think I was around 76 if I remember but they transfuse under 89 in my trust

The oral iron takes a few weeks at least to work

How's your diet

Sorry I meant ambulatory care
So my consultant did the calcs sent the script to the hospital pharmacy and referred me to ambulatory care
Then AC called me and I came in and had it done
It took about an hour?

I wonder if she doesn't want to do the paper work
How is the rest of your care being handled are you happy with it?

Yea so my level is 99 our threshold is Around 78 here . GP prescribed the iron based on midwifes results at 3x daily . Thays not my concern it’s the fact my hb is low but my Mcv is high.

Have you called your midwife to talk to her about this specific concern? She will be able to expand on it for you

your MCV is normal and will often remain relatively high in iron deficiency in pregnancy) . Your haemoglobin is 99, not your iron (there is no iron level on that printout). The commonest cause of anaemia in pregnancy is normal physiological dilution combined with iron deficiency and a relatively high number of new red cells accounts for higher than normal cell volumes that would often be expected in iron deficiency. The lab normal ranges are for the whole population, not pregnancy.

Thank you for that informative response grey beardy . I’ve been worried
about it all tbh . I’m ok with the low iron . I have relatively low iron normally and I understand it’s common in pregnancy . It was the high other level that concerned me as I assumed it would be low with hb being low . I’ve got bad health anxiety .