Guest guest Posted March 18, 2010 Report Share Posted March 18, 2010 Iron overload in pre-menopausal females means a ferritin level of over 200. (Over 300 for for males and post menopausal females.) http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/hemochromatosis/detection.htm I believe the ferritin test is considered more definitive than the saturation, partly because the accuracy of the saturation test can be affected by several things: for example, to be accurate it must be done while the patient is fasting. Other things that can adversely affect the accuracy of the saturation test include the patient taking: - Multivitamins with iron - Multivitamins or pills with vitamin C - Medicinal iron 24 hours* prior to the test. * " 24 hours " is the CDC's recommendation; on this group the recommendation is different - to stop iron supplementing at least five days before iron blood tests. Hope this helps. > > I just got my labs back and am a little concerned about the iron percentage being high. I found this information on the web and am not sure if this is what is happening with me, even though my ferritin is 62 (up from 38) in January: > > >Iron overload - This occurs in conditions associated with excessive iron. TIBC tends to decrease while serum iron is high, resulting in a high % sat.> > > Here is my lab results: > > Total Iron: 146 (40-160) > TIBC: 286 (250-450) > % Saturation: 51 (15-50) > > TSH: <0.01 (0.40 - 4.50) > Free T4: 0.3 (0.8 - 1.8) > Free T3: 324 (210 - 440) > Total T3: 139 (76 - 181) > > I would appreciate any input about what I should do. I want to keep raising my ferritin but I don't want iron overload! > > Thank you, > ~P > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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