All about folic acid: why you should take folic acid and how much to consume?

FOLIC ACID

Folic acid is essential for every woman in childbearing age, as sufficient folic acid uptake will secure mother’s health throughout pregnancy.

Every pregnant mother should take folic acid to avoid defects on fetus while on pregnancy. Examples of birth defects due to lack of folic acid while on pregnancy are anencephaly (brain defects), spina bifida (neural tube defects) and congenital heart defects.

To avoid some serious birth defects,  Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends all women of reproductive age to take at least 400 micrograms (mcg) of folic acid daily in addition to ingesting foods with folate. The source of folic acid can be varied.

Folic acid is essential for pregnant mother as folic acid helps to create new cells for fetal growth. Folic acid also essential to synthesis new DNA in infant’s body throughout pregnancy.

Folic acid is abundant in many food that we eat daily. Some of the food that are rich in folic acids are papaya, strawberry, broccoli, nuts, legumes, eggs and leafy greens.

There are also processed food with fortified folic acid, such as rice, pasta, bread, and some breakfast cereals. The food with fortified folic acid are to overcome lack of folic acid uptake among lower income group.

Alternatively, you can take supplements with known amount of folic acid. Taking folic acid supplement will guarantee you to have sufficient amount of folic acid for daily consumption. Therefore, you should take folic acid supplements or food rich in folic acid to avoid defects on growing fetus as soon you are pregnant.

Why folic acid is important before or during pregnancy?

Folic acid helps to promote healthy fetal growth throughout pregnancy.

Insufficient folic acid cause defects in neural tube development during the early stages of pregnancy. This leads to other defects in growing fetus such as congenital heart defects and brain development defects.

Fetal defects due to lack of folic acid can happen within 3-4 weeks of pregnancy. This is a period before you realize you are pregnant.

When to start taking folic acid?

Every woman at childbearing age and  has decided to get pregnant should start taking folic acid.

Even if she does not intend to get pregnant, every woman  should consume sufficient folic acid daily just in case if they get pregnant accidentally.

How to get sufficient folic acid intake?

Women can obtain folic acid from a variety of sources in addition to taking folic acid supplements.

Some of the tips to ensure sufficient folic acid uptake as follows:

• Taking folic acid supplements: Supplements with known folic acid amount will guarantee you sufficient daily folic acid uptake. You can find folic acid supplements in local pharmacies, supermarket stores, and health shops.
• Eating food with fortified folic acid: Processed food such  as rice, breads, morning cereals, maize and flour may contain fortified folic acid. A certain amount of folic acid added to these food to ensure sufficient folic acid consumption by the population.
• Taking food rich in folic acid: Taking food that are known to have high amount of folic acid will guarantee you to have sufficient folic acid uptake.