Why your iron levels are important in childbearing
From the beginning of pregnancy your iron status is important. Here I'll explain why, and how to help keep your iron levels at a healthy level.
During pregnancy, we monitor your level of iron in two forms: haemeglobin and ferritin.
Haemeglobin is found in your red blood cells. It is the molecule that carries oxygen around your body through your blood stream. The 'haeme' part of this molecule is iron. It is essential that you have enough haemeglobin to carry oxygen around your body. The oxygen is transported from your lungs and deposited in body tissues to provide energy for your body's metabolic functions. In other words, your need plenty of oxygen to have enough energy to maintain your daily life function. When your body has low amounts of haemeglobin, it carries less oxygen around. This affects your energy status and can cause fatigue and irritability. Very low haemeglobin results in iron-deficient aneamia.
During pregnancy, your demand for iron increases dramatically. Apart from performing your normal daily function, your body now has to support a growing baby. This requires building a lot of new tissue including increasing your blood supply so that new tissue can be supplied, thickening your heart muscle, growing your uterus, growing a placenta, and growing a baby!
The increased blood volume in pregnancy also results in 'haemodilution', which means that although your haemeglobin may actually increase to cope with the demands of pregnancy, your whole blood volume increases more, so it appears that your haemeglobin drops. In early pregnancy though, this drop is usually relative to the increase in blood volume and doesn't reflect an actual drop in haemeglobin.
When haemeglobin does run low, your body has a bank where it can draw more iron from. This is what ferritin is. Ferritin is a measure of your body's iron stores. Sometimes your haemeglobin will be at normal levels, but your ferritin has dropped. This tells us that your body is starting to use up iron at a faster rate. It is drawing on more iron from its stores to maintain enough haemeglobin to carryout your body function, and so your storage is becoming depleted. If your ferritin falls below normal levels this is called iron deficiency.
During pregnancy your iron levels are usually checked at booking, and repeated at 28 weeks. Sometimes they are rechecked at 36 weeks if your midwife thinks it will be useful. Iron levels are often normal at the beginning of pregnancy, but by 28 weeks many women's levels will have dropped as the baby begins to grow in size and more iron is needed. If you become iron deficient, or anaemic, you will be offered a prescription of an appropriate dose of iron supplements.
It is important that you take any iron that you have been prescribed. It will help you to feel more energised and less exhausted for a start. It also can have a big impact at the time of birth. Low iron levels are known to increase the risk of women having a haemorrhage following birth. It can also contribute to a slower physical and emotional recovery.
There are also natural ways you can maintain or increase your iron levels. Iron is found in many foods including red meat and dark leafy green vegetables. Red meat contains 'heam' iron which is the most easily absorbed form. Leafy green vegetables contain 'non-haem' iron which is slower to absorb. It is recommended that you consume at least 3 servings of red meat per week, and include leafy green vegetables regularly as part of a balanced diet. Vegetarians can also increase iron intake through legumes, grains, nuts and seeds.
