{"id":147320,"date":"2019-06-10T17:00:46","date_gmt":"2019-06-10T21:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/?p=147320"},"modified":"2021-03-02T14:12:21","modified_gmt":"2021-03-02T19:12:21","slug":"trying-to-conceive-iron-might-not-help","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/news\/articles\/2019\/trying-to-conceive-iron-might-not-help\/","title":{"rendered":"Trying to Conceive? Iron Might Not Help"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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June 10, 2019<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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\"KaleMany women who are trying to get pregnant eat iron-rich foods and take preconception multivitamins that include iron, but there has been little research to see if more iron intake actually helps them conceive. Now, a new study led by School of Public Health researchers finds that there is no consistent association between consuming iron and becoming pregnant.<\/p>\n

The study, published in The Journal of Nutrition<\/em><\/a>, finds that heme iron, which mostly comes from meat, has no effect on how long it takes a woman to conceive. Non-heme iron, which is found mainly in vegetables and dietary supplements, did have a modest effect, but only for women who were more likely to be iron-deficient because of heavy menses or having previously given birth.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the average pregnancy planner, it is probably wise to take a preconception multivitamin, but more for the folic acid than for the iron content,\u201d says study senior author Elizabeth Hatch<\/a>, professor of epidemiology. \u201cIf you have extremely heavy menstrual cycles, it might be a good idea to have your iron status checked by your healthcare provider.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hatch and her colleagues analyzed data from two prospectively-studied cohorts of women who were trying to conceive: 2,969 North American women in the SPH-based PRESTO study<\/a> and 1,693 Danish women in the Snart Foraeldre study. In both cohorts, participants completed questionnaires every eight weeks for one year or until they conceived. The researchers estimated heme and non-heme iron intake from the questionnaire responses about diet and dietary supplement use.<\/p>\n

The researchers found no association between a woman\u2019s intake of heme iron and the number of cycles it took for her to conceive. However, consuming more non-heme iron (both from dietary supplements and from food) was associated with a slightly increased chance of pregnancy in women who had previously given birth. In the PRESTO cohort, non-heme iron intake was also associated with a slightly increased chance of conception among women who had heavy menses or short menstrual cycles.<\/p>\n

The lead author of the study, Kristen Hahn (SPH\u201914), was a doctoral student and research fellow when the work was conducted. The other SPH co-authors were\u00a0Amelia Wesselink<\/a>, a post-doctoral associate in epidemiology;\u00a0Lauren Wise<\/a>,\u00a0professor of epidemiology;\u00a0Marco Vinceti<\/a>, adjunct associate professor of epidemiology; and\u00a0Kenneth Rothman<\/a>, professor of epidemiology. The other co-authors were Ellen Mikkelsen, Heidi Cueto, and Henrik Toft Sorensen of Aarhus University Hospital in Denmark, and Katherine Tucker of the University of Massachusetts Lowell.<\/p>\n

\u2014Michelle Samuels<\/em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

PRESTO is still enrolling participants. Learn more<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Little association between iron intake and fertility overall, except modest benefits from non-heme iron for women with iron deficiency. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10989,"featured_media":147340,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"bu_prepress_billboard":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term_manual":""},"tags":[2209,2556,2194,2068,1850,2158],"bu-publication":[3516],"sphnews-article-category":[3519,3530,3531,3540],"sphnews-topic":[],"bu_edition":[],"media_type":[],"profile_tax":[3094,319,480,498,2316],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/147320"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/bu-article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10989"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147320"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/147320\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":192676,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/147320\/revisions\/192676"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147320"},{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=147320"},{"taxonomy":"sphnews-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sphnews-article-category?post=147320"},{"taxonomy":"sphnews-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sphnews-topic?post=147320"},{"taxonomy":"bu_edition","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu_edition?post=147320"},{"taxonomy":"media_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media_type?post=147320"},{"taxonomy":"profile_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/sph\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/profile_tax?post=147320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}