Hemochromatosis

Haemochromatosis A relatively unknown disease is an hereditary disease that causes the body to retain too much iron. It is caused by a defect in the gene that regulates the absorption of iron from foods. People with haemochromatosis absorb up to as much as four or five times as much iron as people without the disease and the body has no way of ridding itself of iron, so the iron builds up and can cause damage to the liver, heart and pancreas.Along with so many other debilitating side effects, such as; serious lack of energy,tired all the time, extremely painful joints, early onset of arthritis, brown spots and patching, week muscles, skin thinning, hair loss (even eyebrows and and body hair) Depression, though I think is is probably because of all the latter, not surprisingly!

 

The main treatment for haemochromatosis includes regular phlebotomy, blood-letting which is very similar to donating blood and also by controlling iron absorption through a stricter diet regime.

Note: Although if, like me, you also have problems with high cholesterol, this can cause a few more added problems...............more about that later.

Each day I am going to tell you how you can help control this disease and the sort of foods to increase and similarly avoid.

If you have been Haemochromatosis or seem to be suffering with syptoms of such I would love to hear from you. Tweat me at www.twitter.com/ironoverload