8 Ways to Prevent Anemia

Iron deficiency can cause anemia, a shortage of hemoglobin in the blood. This can lead to weakness,
fatigue, a pale face and earlobes, and brittle, spoon-shaped nails. There are other causes of anemia
besides nutritional deficiencies, including massive or chronic blood loss.
The best way to tell if you have enough iron in your body is to find out if you have enough iron in your
blood. A finger-stick hemoglobin check can be done in your doctors office. This test requires only one
tiny drop of blood, and the results are available within a few minutes. Pediatricians often use this test to
check hemoglobin levels in nine-to fifteen-month-old infants. Your doctor may check hemoglobin levels at
other ages of increased iron needs too, such as during female adolescence or pregnancy. Normal
hemoglobin values are:

infants and children 11 to 13 grams

women 12 to 16 grams

men 14 to 18 grams

You can prevent iron-deficiency anemia by making wise food choices for yourself and your family. Getting
your daily iron from food is preferable to taking iron supplements, which sometimes cause abdominal
discomfort and constipation. Here are some ways to assure there is enough iron in your familys diet.
1. Breastfeed your baby as long as possible. Once upon a time it was believed that breastfed
babies needed iron supplements because human milk was low in iron. Yet, breastfed babies
studied at four to six months of age had a higher hemoglobin than infants who were fed ironfortified formula. Breastfed babies have been found to have sufficient iron stores for nine months
or longer. Human milk remains an important part of babys diet, even after the introduction of
solids.
2. Use an iron-fortified formula. If bottle feeding, use an iron-fortified formula, preferably beginning
at birth, but at least starting by three months of age. Continue iron-fortified formula for at least one
year or as long as your babys doctor recommends, which is usually until your infant is eating
adequate amounts of other dietary sources of iron. Do not use low-iron formulas, which do not
contain sufficient iron for a growing babys needs.
3. Delay cows milk feeding for infants; limit it for toddlers. The Committee on Nutrition of the
American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents delay using cows milk as a beverage
until a baby is at least one year of age. There are two iron-related reasons for this: cows milk is
low in iron, and cows milk can irritate the intestinal lining, causing bleeding and the loss of iron.
This is a tiny amount of blood loss, but over a long period of time it can be significant. The
combination of poor iron intake and increased iron loss sets a baby up for iron deficiency anemia,
and excessive milk consumption is a common cause of iron deficiency anemia in toddlers. An
eighteen-month-old who consumes forty ounces of milk a day may be plump, but is probably very
pale. Unless advised otherwise by your babys doctor, limit your toddlers cow milk intake to no
more than 24 ounces a day.

4. Combine foods wisely. Eating a food rich in vitamin C along with a good iron source will help
your body use the iron. Here are some classic examples:
o

spaghetti with meat and tomato sauce

meat and potatoes

chicken fajitas with broccoli, sweet pepper, and tomatoes

hamburger and coleslaw

nitrate-free hot dogs and orange juice

fruit, iron-fortified cereal, and raisins

fresh fruit with raisins

5. Try prune juice as a regular beverage. Prune juice is one of the few juices that is high in iron (3
milligrams of iron per cup). The process involved in making prune juice retains more of the fruits
original nutrients than the juicing of other fruits.
6. Cook in iron pots. The acid in foods seems to pull some of the iron out of the cast-iron pots.
Simmering acidic foods, such as tomato sauce, in an iron pot can increase the iron content of the
brew more than ten-fold. Cooking foods containing other acids, such as vinegar, red wine, lemon
or lime juice, in an iron pot can also increase the iron content of the final mixture.
7. Bake with iron-rich grains. The usual wheat used to make bread and pastries is relatively low in
iron (around one milligram of iron per half cup). Lesser known grains, such as amaranth (8
milligrams per half cup) and quinoa (9 milligrams per half cup) are much richer in iron. Barley
grains contain four milligrams of iron per half cup. Mixing these grains into the wheat flour you
use when you bake will increase the iron content of the finished product.