A combination of iron and retinol supplementation benefits iron status, IL-2 level and lymphocyte proliferation in anemic pregnant women

Background: Iron and vitamin A deficiencies impact anemia and the immune system. Objective: to investigate the effect of iron combined with retinol supplementation on iron status, IL-2 level and lymphocyte proliferation. Methods: a double-blind randomized trial conducted over 2 months. We randomly allocated 186 anemic pregnant women with 80 <= Hb<110 g/L into four groups. Group I (n=47) was supplemented daily with 60 mg iron as ferrous sulfate, IF (n=46) with 60 mg iron and 0.4 mg folic acid, IR (n=46) with 60 mg iron, 2.0 mg retinol and 0.4 mg folic acid and C (n=47) was the placebo group. Results: after the 2 months trial, there were considerable increases of iron status in Hb, plasma iron and ferritin in the I, IF and IR groups compared with Group C. Increases in plasma iron and ferritin in the IR group were also significantly greater than in Groups I and IF. Compared with group C, increases of IL-2 levels were 119, 184 and 206 ng/L; and lymphocyte proliferation increased by 0.095, 0.112 and 0.219 in Groups I, IF and IR, respectively. Increases of IL-2 were 65.3 ng/L and 87.5 ng/L in Groups IF and IR, greater than in Group I (both p values <0.01); and lymphocyte proliferation in Group IR were 0.124 and 0.107, also greater than in Groups I and IF, respectively. Conclusion: iron combined retinol supplementation was more beneficial to improving iron status and lymphocyte proliferation during pregnancy than iron alone.