Recommended iron intake: How and when is it best to take iron?

Consumed half an hour to an hour before a meal, the bioavailability is best; consumed with a meal, the consumption is more tolerable.

The following applies to all iron supplements: Never take them at the same time as milk or dairy products. There should also be an interval of at least two hours between taking supplements containing calcium or magnesium.

In addition, you should drink coffee and black or green tea at different times to when you take the iron supplement or eat a meal, because the ingredients in these drinks can bind most of the iron and affect its absorption into the body.

It is best to take iron with orange juice (or another vitamin C-containing beverage) before meals, as this increases absorption in the body – or you can choose an iron supplement with vitamin C.

The issue of tolerance in particular is more important today than ever before: current guidelines recommend high doses of salts of bivalent iron (50 to 100 mg per day) to counteract low iron levels. The motto seems to be ‘high dose, strong effect’. It is an open secret that these very high dosages are often not tolerated.

However, a new finding reached the scientific mainstream several years ago – unfortunately without making the appropriate waves: low-dose iron is more effective than high-dose iron.

A team of researchers at ETH Zurich has shown in a study that lower amounts of iron are absorbed much more efficiently than high doses of iron, and they also allow for a gentler increase in iron levels. It therefore makes sense to take iron in lower amounts altogether. So you see: sometimes you have to leave even iron principles behind.