Iron Deficiency Anemia
What Is Anemia?
Anemia (uh-NEE-me-eh) is a condition in which a person’s blood has a lower than normal number of red blood cells (RBCs), or the RBCs don’t have enough hemoglobin (HEE-muh-glow-bin). Hemoglobin—an iron-rich protein that gives the red color to blood—carries oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body. In people with anemia symptoms, the blood does not carry enough oxygen to the rest of the body. As a result, people with anemia feel tired, along with other symptoms, because their bodies are not receiving enough oxygen. In severe or prolonged cases of iron anemia, the lack of oxygen in the blood can cause serious and sometimes fatal damage to the heart and other organs of the body.
RBCs also are called erythrocytes (eh-RITH-ro-sites). RBCs are disc-shaped and look like doughnuts without a hole in the center. They are produced continually in the spongy marrow inside the large bones of the body and normally last 120 days. RBCs’ main role is to carry oxygen, but they also remove carbon dioxide (a waste product) from cells and carry it to the lungs to be exhaled. White blood cells and platelets are the two other kinds of blood cells. White blood cells help fight infections. Platelets help blood to clot. In some symptoms of anemia, there are low amounts of all three types of blood cells.
What is iron deficiency anemia?
Anemia means having fewer or smaller red blood cells than normal. Iron is a key part of hemoglobin, which is the part of the red blood cell that carries oxygen from the lungs out to the rest of the body. Children can get iron deficiency anemia symptoms when there is not enough iron in their diet to make a normal amount of hemoglobin in their blood.
What problems can anemia iron deficiency cause?
Iron deficiency anemia can cause your infant or toddler to have mental, motor or behavior problems. These problems can be long lasting even after treatment fixes the anemia.
Who gets iron deficiency anemia symptoms and how do I prevent it?
Infants who drink cow's milk in the first year of life are at risk for anemia iron deficiency. Cow's milk is the most common dietary cause of iron deficiency in infants. Do not give cow's milk to your infant in the first year of life. Breastfed infants who do not eat iron-rich foods like iron-fortified cereal or take an iron supplement after the fourth month of life are at risk. If your child is breastfed, add some form of iron to the child's diet starting at 4 to 6 months of age, using iron-fortified cereal or vitamin drops with iron.
Toddlers (12 to 24 months of age) who drink a lot of cow's milk, have a diet low in iron, or already had iron deficiency as an infant are at risk.
If you use iron-fortified formula, do not give your child vitamin drops with iron. This combination provides too much iron and is not healthy. If you decide to stop breastfeeding before your infant is 12 months of age, use iron-fortified formula. Do not use low-iron formula.
After your child is 12 months old, if you stop breastfeeding or using iron-fortified formula, you should feed your toddler meat, chicken, fish, whole grains, enriched bread and cereal, dark green vegetables, and beans. Vitamin C is also important because it helps the body absorb iron. You should limit your child to less than 24 oz of cow's milk per day. (That's 3 cups of milk.) You might try giving your child yogurt and cheese. You also may want to continue giving vitamins with iron.
Who should be tested for iron deficiency and when?
Infants at risk for iron deficiency should be checked with a blood test at 9 to 12 months of age. Toddlers should be checked six months later and at 24 months.
Warning
Keep all products with iron stored out of the reach of your child because they can be poisonous if taken in very large amounts.
Information Obtained From National Institute Of Health