hey everyone it's sarah with registernursern.com and in this video i'm going to be doing an nclex review over iron deficiency anemia this video is part of an nclex review series over hematology so what i'm going to be doing in this video is i'm going to be covering what iron deficiency anemia is the patho the causes the signs and symptoms and the nursing interventions and giving you some mnemonics on how to remember some of this material so let's get started first let's start out talking about what is the definition of iron deficiency anemia this is a type of anemia that is caused by low iron levels so the big thing with this is that we have anemia going on because we don't have enough iron in the body but what is anemia anemia is the decreased amount of red blood cells or hemoglobin in the body and these components play a huge role in carrying oxygen throughout your body so if you do not have enough of this you are going to be experiencing your tissues and organs are going to be deprived of oxygen and later on depending on how severe this is you'll start showing signs and symptoms of it so before we dive into the patho let's talk about the key points we need to remember about this disease that's going on okay this iron deficiency anemia is the most common type of anemia there's various forms which i will be covering but this is the most common type the body uses iron to make hemoglobin so without iron you don't you won't have enough hemoglobin and low iron levels lead the body to produce fewer red blood cells which leads to less hemoglobin and hence your body will receive less oxygen which here in a second you're going to see why the under the reasoning behind this in the patho part now at first the signs and symptoms of iron deficiency anemia are vague the patient probably won't know what's going on they may just feel a little fatigued but as it gets worse and worse because they're not treating it it will progress where they become more noticeable and iron deficiency anemia is usually diagnosed the patient will go in talk about this the doctor may order a cbc a complete blood count which they'll look at the red blood cells and the hemoglobin level hematocrit levels see if those are normal may order an iron level because remember iron plays a huge role in making hemoglobin or they may do a blood smear test where they will take and look under a microscope at the red blood cells and look at their appearance because they will have a specific appearance in iron deficiency anemia and treatment for this condition will be diet changes and putting more iron in the diet in iron-rich foods iron supplementation with medication and how to prevent this okay so now let's talk about the patho what is going on in the body okay here we have a red blood cell our key player here is our red blood cell and the red blood cells role is it acts as the car and it functions to transport oxygen and remove carbon dioxide from the body with the help of hemoglobin big part hemoglobin which you will see in here is an ingredient that is found in the red blood cell that is a protein that contains iron so hemoglobin and iron love each other and iron your iron stores 70 of your iron is actually found in your hemoglobin so iron makes hemoglobin so you need iron to make hemoglobin hence to play the whole role in transporting oxygen throughout the body because if you don't have enough of this the red blood cell even though it'll be going around doing its job if you don't have the hemoglobin on board to do its job you it can't carry the oxygen and transport it throughout the body so they go hand in hand so the hemoglobin function in a nutshell is to facilitate the transfer of oxygen and carbon dioxide so with iron deficiency anemia when you have low iron you will have less hemoglobin less red blood cells in turn you will have less oxygen in the body and your body does not like low oxygen levels okay so what causes iron deficiency anemia three big things easy to remember okay number one poor intake what can this be from one pregnancy as the mother goes through as she gets up to nine months the fetal demands for iron is great and if she's not taking it in through her diet taking prenatal vitamins she can experience this or a poor diet overall patients not eating malnourished they can have this or someone who follows a vegetarian diet they need to make sure that they're incorporating foods that have iron in them because they are susceptible to this second cause is an absorption problem your intestines your gut plays a huge role in absorbing iron so if you've had intestinal surgery gastric bypass your risk for this um celiac disease because you have damage to the intestines and you won't be absorbing as much iron as you need also the small intestine say you had it removed and the small intestine plays a huge role in absorbing iron so any issues with small intestine you can have iron deficiency anemia and then the last thing which is the most obvious losing iron from blood loss any type of extreme blood loss can cause this for women who have heavy menstruation they are definitely at risk for this or losing a lot of blood um gi bleeding ulcers in the stomach or hemorrhoids they can also develop this okay so what are the major signs and symptoms that you need to know for nclex or your nursing lecture exams for iron deficiency anemia to help you remember the signs and symptoms remember the pneumonic low iron because that is the whole deal with this disease is that they have really low iron levels okay so l they are going to be lethargic and this plays back to they have low oxygen being transported through the body because the red blood cells and hemoglobin can't do their job of transporting it where it needs to go so they'll be tired oh they're going to be over exerted easily again because of low oxygen and they may have shortness of breath you know walking back and forth up and heel that they normally could walk up they all of a sudden knows it's a lot harder for them they need to sit down and rest and they get short of breath and that's just again because your respiratory system we did a whole nclex review on respiratory plays a huge role in delivering oxygen and your red blood cells are in those alveolar sacs collecting the oxygen and if your red blood cells aren't there to collect the oxygen you're breathing in then it's no good and you're not transporting the oxygen where you need to get next w for weird food cravings some even your pregnant patients if a patient reports that they're craving like ice continually or clay or dirt that could be a sign that the body is low on iron another thing w for white face um meaning pale they'll have this pale powder look to them because of the low oxygen next eye inflammation of the tongue also known as glossitis this is where the tongue will instead of being textured it'll have a smooth appearance it'll be red and inflamed maybe various shades of red and this is due to the decreased oxygen that the tongue is receiving because remember we have issues with having enough oxygen transported in our body another eye would be increased heart rate and the heart rate increases becomes tachycardic because the body is trying to compensate for the low oxygen levels by pumping faster getting that to the body for reduced hemoglobin level okay o for um they'll you'll be able to observe changes in the red blood cells if a blood smear was done i would remember this so whenever they go get a blood smear they had iron deficiency anemia what would those red blood cells look like okay they would be hypochromic meaning they would be pale they have a pelvic to them and microcytic this is where they would be small so they're going to be really pale and really small compared to um having nice color to them and being normal size next in for nail changes the nails can change in appearance depending on how long they've had this the severity of it and they can turn and have a spoon shape to them and the medical term for this is coleonica another change they can have are neuro changes and this is where they will have the inability to concentrate they'll be moody and not feel like they normally do now to nursing interventions nursing interventions include what you're going to do as a nurse is you're going to monitor them you're going to educate them and you're going to administer meds so what you'll be monitoring for you'll be monitoring them for any bleeding because remember this can contribute to iron deficiency anemia you're going to be watching their hemoglobin hematocrit levels and watching for those major signs and symptoms we just went over seeing if they are getting worse also you're going to educate them on how to take their iron supplements a lot of times patients will be prescribed iron and there are some things you want to remember as the nurse whenever you're providing education to them so here it is they want to take the iron on an empty stomach this increases absorption sometimes iron can upset the stomach so they can maybe eat a small amount of food with it to prevent those gi upsets but it's best to take it on an empty stomach take it with vitamin c vitamin c like orange juice because vitamin c increases absorption of iron next they do not want to take iron along with any milk products calcium or antacids and if they have to take this stuff they need to wait two hours in between before they take the iron and then they take the calcium antacid or whatever they need to take because that decreases absorption let the patient know that whenever they have a bowel movement that they're stool it's normal for it to look dark black that means that the body is actually absorbing the iron but it's not normal to have dark tarry stools or any blood in it that's not normal but a dark colored stool is normal whenever take an iron liquid preparations and it's best to mix it in a drink and drink it through a straw because it can stain the teeth and to brush the teeth afterwards to prevent it from staining the teeth side effects of iron is constipation so educate your patient make sure they're consuming lots of liquids and if they need to they can get an over-the-counter stool softener like colace helps soften the stool to prevent constipation also as the nurse depending on how low their iron level is you may give it iv or the hemoglobin hematocrit's really low you may be giving blood also you'll want to educate your patients on how to incorporate iron in their diet because a lot of nursing lecture exams or nclex on the nclex that may give you a scenario and ask you which foods are best for a patient to eat who has iron deficiency anemia so help so to help you remember which foods are high in iron remember the mnemonic eat lots of iron and each letter will correspond with a food so e for egg yolks a for apricots tea for tofu l for legumes also leafy green vegetables like spinach o for oysters any shellfish is good t for tuna s for sardines and seeds and then the o in potatoes f for fish like halibut haddock or salmon i for iron fortified cereal or breads are for red meats like beef very rich in iron or raisins and then o in the word poultry any chicken turkey that is rich in iron and then the last one in for nuts okay so thank you so much for watching that was about iron deficiency anemia and be sure to go to my website register nursery.com and take that free quiz and don't forget to subscribe to this youtube channel