If you’re here then you’ve probably Google’d about: prenatal vitamins good for non pregnant women.
What Are Prenatal Vitamins?
Prenatal vitamins are specifically geared toward women thinking about becoming pregnant or who are pregnant. The concept behind prenatal vitamins is that some of a women’s nutritional and vitamin needs increase with pregnancy. A baby especially needs certain nutrients to develop.
Expectant moms don’t always take in enough nutrients in their daily diets. Prenatal vitamins are meant to bridge the nutritional gap.
How Are Prenatal Vitamins Different From Traditional Multivitamins?
Lots of different prenatal vitamin types are available on the market. Prenatal vitamins typically have between 200 and 300 mg of calcium. Calcium is important for all women because it keeps their bones strong.
Taking in enough folic acid is linked with reducing neural tube defects like spina bifida. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommends that pregnant women (and those trying to get pregnant) take in 600 micrograms (mcg) of folic acid every day from all sources. This mineral is necessary to create new red blood cells in the body.
Because a woman increases her blood volume during pregnancy, iron is a must-have. Prenatal vitamins often contain other vitamins and minerals.
When Should I Take Prenatal Vitamins?
Always talk with your doctor before starting to take prenatal vitamins.
Women who are carrying multiples, pregnant teenagers, and pregnant women with a history of substance abuse have a higher risk of vitamin and mineral deficiencies. Doctors often recommend that women who are breastfeeding also continue taking prenatal vitamins after delivery. Prenatal vitamins can serve as a further supplement to lactating women who need plenty of nutrients to make breast milk.
That’s because half of the pregnancies in the United States aren’t planned.
Can I Take Prenatal Vitamins If I Don’T Want To Get Pregnant?
They’re geared to make up the common nutritional deficiencies a pregnant woman could have. Excess iron can be a problem, too. Excess amounts of nutrients like vitamin A taken from synthetic vitamins could be toxic to a person’s liver.
Again, it’s better if you get these nutrients through your diet instead of a pill. Some claim that taking prenatal vitamins makes hair grow thicker or faster, and that nails could grow faster or stronger too. Taking prenatal vitamins for better hair or nails likely won’t bring the desired results.
They could also have adverse side effects.
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Are a few key differences, since some nutrient needs change when growing a human. For example, many pregnant people do not consume the recommended amount of choline, so we included it in our prenatal multivitamin.
We also added iodine, since the recommended amount of iodine increases during pregnancy. Our third addition to our prenatal multivitamin: biotin, because scientific evidence suggests that higher biotin intake may be needed to meet the requirement for pregnancy. For example, our.
Essential Prenatal
And our prenatal multivitamin has more folate, which supports neural tube development during pregnancy. Since up to one-third of people have genetic variations that make it difficult to efficiently utilize folic acid, we opted to use a form called 5-MTHF, which is a bioavailable form for the body to use. Let’s talk about biotin as an example: Many women can meet their biotin needs through diet alone, since it’s found in a wide range of foods like eggs, avocado, beef, and yeast.
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Recently Gave Birth?
Then consider making a different multivitamin switch—from a prenatal multivitamin to a postnatal multivitamin. *
What About Iron?
Another common question is iron. And while it’s true that some non-pregnant people may need more iron than others (due to vegan and other restrictive diets, as well as certain conditions), we recommend consulting with a healthcare provider to determine how to go about supplementation for specific needs before making the switch to a prenatal multivitamin. It’s pretty simple: Take prenatal multivitamins if pregnant or planning to be pregnant—and switch to a postnatal multivitamin if recently given birth.
And for all of the above, don’t forget to lead with a mostly-healthy, balanced diet.