I had the impression that healthy non-vegetarian men are more likely to have too much iron than too little. I actually donate blood regularly partly to keep my iron down, since I eat a lot of red meat.
I had the impression that healthy non-vegetarian men are more likely to have too much iron than too little. I actually donate blood regularly partly to keep my iron down, since I eat a lot of red meat.
1) we treat iron deficiency anemia, and he is not anemic - in fact he is stone cold normal
2) iron values are subject to different biological processes, and a low iron level is not in itself diagnostic of iron deficiency - he may not be iron deficient at all (based on the info he's provided)
Ah ok. I haven't done my homework properly. This was Wikipedia I think.
Toxicity of even normal iron levels in adult (men) without hemochromatosis is an area of active research. But there's a lot of basic science rationale to assume that there is such a thing as too much.
Me neither. There has been a LONG association between iron and free radical generation / oxidative stress. When I was in high school in the late 80s / early 90s I did research on this at a local university looking at superoxide dismutase and oxidative stress due to iron in a yeast model.
The thing is I haven't seen much to show that prevention of oxidative stress prevents ANY disease, so as far as I'm concerned the iron stuff is theoretical.
There is a known risk of sepsis due to IV iron infusions in patients on total parenteral nutrition, and this is thought to be because many bacteria are highly siderophoric (iron scavenging). This has never been associated with oral iron supplementation.
Interesting about the sepsis. I did not know that, though thinking about it- I'm guessing yersinia and listeria??? Cool :-)