[ultrazord]

Hello,

I am mildly Iron deficient because I've been having a weak diet...
so I went to the store and bought a 60pack of time release iron pills which are
"ascorbic acid 500mg + ferrous sulfate 7H2O 525mg (105 mg Fe++)"

... it turns out these pills contain much more iron than what is actually healthy for me.
The recommended dose of Iron for non-iron deficient people is around 10mg/day.

So my questions are:

• do the pills I have bought contain 525 mg of iron, or do they contain 105mg of iron? (i suspect the latter)
• can i crush these pills and take like 1/5th of such a pill everyday?
  that would then equal around 20mg/iron per day... which is a much more ideal dose for me.
  I'm kind of worried that if i have these crushed iron pills being exposed to air for 4 days,
  that they would react with air and become a useless... or perhaps toxic chemical to my body?

The reason I want to supplement with iron, alongside having a more iron rich diet from now on...
is because I want to boost my iron levels more rapidly than which would
be the case when having a more iron rich diet alone.

I'm having uncomfortable physical problems which I suspect are caused by iron deficiency,
so I want them to be fixed as quickly as possible.





I hope this is the right forum for this kind of question.
Thank you very much 

[Borek]

do the pills I have bought contain 525 mg of iron, or do they contain 105mg of iron? (i suspect the latter)

105 mg.

No idea about the other question and I am not going to speculate. Too many factors to be taken into account. Besides, IANADoc.

[BluRay]

so I went to the store and bought a 60pack of time release iron pills

if they are time release they are probably covered with a substance that forbids the immediate take of iron from the body,(but don't know if this covers the entire pill or it covers micro-balls of active principle); if you break the pills then the pieces could be no time release anylonger. I think the better thing is to ask a druggist.

[ultrazord]

i've had one crushed dose so far and some hours after having taken it my tongue got really irritated,
burning sensation + swollen "small spots on the tongue"

i don't know if it was because of direct contact with my tongue or not...
but it is enough to not make me take more of it this way.
guess i'm gonna have to spend some extra money for properly dosed iron 

[JGK]

http://dietary-supplements.info.nih.gov/factsheets/iron.asp

I'd be wary of taking this type of supplement unless you have a medical condition that requires it, try modifying your diet first. Over ingestion of heavy metals could cause you even more health problems than you already have.

As the RDI for Iron is 7 - 11 mg (males) or 7 - 18 mg (females, 27 mg if pregnant), the pills you have are very high dosage (unless the time release is over several days?). As they are time release I'd be wary of crushing them.

[Borek]

I think the better thing is to ask a druggist.

So far that was the only reasonable advice.