This is the most common mistake I see in terms of getting iron tested.

Don't make this one mistake. When you're getting your iron tested, you finally learned about how iron can affect your mood, including anxiety and panic, and you're ready to get tested. But you want to get the best and most accurate results. So here's what not to do before you do your iron blood test. Don't take iron supplements. Sounds crazy, right? The reason you don't want to take iron for 10 hours before you do your iron blood test is because when you take iron, you're going to have iron in your blood. Makes sense, right? And so if you take an iron supplement and then you go and get a blood draw, you may have falsely elevated levels of iron. If you're actually struggling from iron deficiency, getting a false elevation of iron because you've taken iron could obscure your results. While knowing how to test iron is all good, there is a big problem with testing iron to begin with. Serum iron is not a very accurate assessment of your overall levels of iron. Think of serum iron like loose change in your pocket. You may have a mountain of debt, and then you walk down the street and you find a $20 bill or some quarters on the street, you put them in your pocket. Obviously that's not a good gauge on how much wealth you have. So if we assess you by just looking at what you have on you in terms of iron in that very moment in the blood, we're going to get a false reading. The better test is ferritin, which looks at storage iron. See my other videos to learn more.