I was surfing a bit around the web today and came across this site: http://www.umm.edu/altmed/articles/iron-000964.htm
It lists several medications that either reduce iron absorption, experience reduced absorption themselves in the presence of iron, experience decreased effectiveness or blood levels in the presence of iron or increase iron absorption.
Shouldn't people diagnosed with Hemochromatosis be given recommendations regarding these medications? If you have a serum ferritin over 1000 and are taking ACE inhibitors for blood pressure wouldn't it be expected to be less effective?
The purpose of this site was to inform people taking iron supplements about what medication interactions they should be aware of. So it is possible that these medications only have interactions when ingested with iron pills?
I only have questions at this point. But the ones that jumps out at me are
- Oral contraceptives increase iron levels
- Tetracyclines are not absorbed as well with iron (so perhaps if a teen with acne does not respond to tetracycline as their dermatologist expected that may indicate they should have their iron tested?)
- ACE Inhibitors as discussed earlier since many hemochromatosis patients may also have high blood pressure. So a different medication would seem to be logical or an adjustment of the dos