Micronutrient Status in Female University Students: Iron, Zinc, Copper, Selenium, Vitamin B12 and Folate.

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            During this study, 308 female students were tested, with the ages ranging from 18-35 years old, which were of childbearing age or menstruating women, this group had a mean age of 22 years old. This study did not include any pregnant women, breastfeeding women, women with eating disorders or who are an elite athlete. The participants were also not allowed to be taking a supplement or vitamin. The mean BMI of the group was 21.5, with 78% of the individuals being at a healthy weight for their age and height and about 20% of the individuals being either overweight or underweight while a small percentage of them were obese.
The females that participated were recruited through internet advertisements, flyers and through word of mouth. They study collected data from the women that included their anthropometrics, behaviors, and basic characteristics. They also took blood to be analyzed for many biomarkers, including iron, B-12, zinc, folate, selenium, copper and homocysteine. The blood tests were taken when the women were at a fasted state which lasted from 10-12 hours. Iron was the main micronutrient wanting to be looked at due to the high prevalence of iron-deficiency anemia in younger women. It was found that 43.9% of individuals had some type of anemia, including iron-deficiency anemia.
The blood was analyzed through software at a hospital called SPSS software. The main finding was that low iron status was prominent in younger women which was seen through the low serum ferritin levels in 33.9% of the women, but the study did disclose that the data could be skewed due to the inability they had to determine inflammation markers, which could cause the blood tests to be different from these results. BG.     
Fayet-Moore, F., Petocz, P., & Samman, S. (2014). Micronutrient Status in Female University Students: Iron, Zinc, Copper, Selenium, Vitamin B12 and Folate. Nutrients, 6(11), 5103–5116. http://doi.org/10.3390/nu6115103

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