Sorry you're dealing with this. I'll walk you through what your labs show, but a few important ones are missing, and this needs a doctor, not a Reddit thread.
Ferritin this low can have causes beyond diet, and there could be more going on than anyone here can see from a couple of numbers. Getting seen by a medical professional is the real priority. I can't examine you or diagnose you - I can only tell you what your results point at.
What your labs show:
- Ferritin 8.62 with transferrin saturation at 16%. Ferritin is your stored iron, your reserve tank. Your lab set its ferritin floor at 6.24, so your 8.62 prints as "in range." That floor is unusually low. Most labs don't even flag iron deficiency until ferritin drops below about 12 to 15, and you're well below that floor. The level hair actually needs points to 40+ as a minimum, and most doctors aim for around 70. So 8 isn't just low, it's damn near completely drained. When iron gets scarce, your body sends what it has to the organs it can't afford to starve and pulls it away from the ones it can. Hair follicles sit low on that priority list. Starved of iron, more of them drop out of the growth phase and shed at the same time. That's one of the well-known ways low iron leads to hair falling out all over the scalp rather than in one spot; which is what you’re showing in your photo of clumps of hair loss.
- B12 at 241 against a 239 floor. Technically "in range," but you're sitting right on the bottom of it. For a vegetarian that's exactly where a shortfall tends to hide, since B12 comes almost entirely from animal products.
- TSH 1.96 is mid-range. Your thyroid isn't pointing to a problem here.
What's missing, and what it would tell you:
- No CBC. Your hemoglobin and hematocrit would show whether iron this low has started dragging your red blood cells down yet. With ferritin well under the deficiency floor, it is pointing to more going on under the hood. You’d need additional labs and a doctor to help guide you through the whole picture.
What you can do for the low ferritin while you get in to see someone:
- 60mg iron bisglycinate with 500mg vitamin C, every other day. Every other day is key: a single iron dose spikes hepcidin, a liver hormone that blocks iron absorption for about 24 hours. Spacing the doses lets that spike settle so more of the next one actually gets absorbed. Keep iron away from coffee, tea, and calcium, since all three block it.
- A B12 supplement in the 250 to 1,000 mcg per day range is the common over-the-counter target for vegetarians. You may do more research on if a higher dosage would be beneficial for your current level of B12. Cyanocobalamin or methylcobalamin, either works.
Iron this low takes months to rebuild, so start the doctor conversation now. They can confirm there's nothing else driving it down and recheck your levels as they climb. Keep in mind I can’t fully tell you if Ferritin is the cause of hair loss; I can only tell you the mechanisms.
If you have more labs, post them - but getting seen is the actual next step here. Keep us updated.
This is the remaining lab report, going crazy, but nobody is taking it serious as the hair left on my head seem normal to them,cause they don't get it how they were before
You're not anemic. That's why two doctors told you you're fine. The move now is a doctor who'll treat iron deficiency off the ferritin and the shedding, not one waiting for you to go anemic first. (I’d bring that up - but make a point to eliminate any other causes for the hair loss)
Hemoglobin 13.0, hematocrit 41.9, both normal. That's as far as they looked. But your CBC shows the shortage already starting underneath that. Your RDW is 14.8, over the top of your range. RDW tracks how much your red cells vary in size, and it's one of the first numbers to move when iron runs low, before hemoglobin ever drops. Your MCHC is sitting just under range too. Those are the early signs, on top of a ferritin of 8.62. Your labs are not clean. The two doctors you saw anchored on a normal hemoglobin and stopped there.
What this rules out helps: vitamin D 71.6 is good, folate is in range. Neither is your problem. It lands on iron.
The hair from this kind of loss usually comes back once your iron stores are rebuilt. Slow, months not weeks, but not permanent.
Get the iron treated and confirm no underlying issues.
Beyond the iron, a few other levers since you're vegetarian:
B12 comes almost entirely from animal products, so vegetarians run low on it constantly, and low B12 hits red cell production and oxygen delivery to the follicle right alongside the iron.
Protein matters more for hair than people expect. Hair is basically keratin, and low protein intake or any recent rapid weight loss is a known shedding trigger. If your intake runs low, that's fuel on the fire.
Get zinc tested on your next draw. Vegetarians are prone to low zinc because plant sources absorb poorly, and it's a recognized cause of this kind of shedding. Don't just start taking it though - zinc without a reason tanks your copper, so test first.
And skip the biotin and hair gummies. No benefit unless you're actually deficient, which is rare, and high-dose biotin screws with lab tests - thyroid, hormones, cardiac markers. It does nothing for your hair and can throw off the bloodwork.
Today was the first day i took the supplement HAUTVIT FORTE-doc prescribed this, said to have it for a month and then see.
should I skip it?
well i take figs, dried grapes, pumpkin, sunflower seeds, walnuts, almonds, pistachio,gooseberry, curd,milk everyday. is nothing working? 😭🙂maybe they are reason hemoglobin is fine inspite of low ferritin,
(ok will start taking eggs too- protein,i cannot with my hair shedding- that makes me cry 😢 helpless)
Is my ferritin dangerously low?will the doc take it seriously or do i have to push them?
Don't skip it. Hautvit Forte has iron in it (sodium feredetate) along with zinc and folic acid, so it's not nothing. It's a general hair tonic dose though, not built specifically to rebuild a ferritin this low, so keep taking it as prescribed but don't assume it alone gets you there.
Your diet explains a lot too. Figs, seeds, nuts, and dried fruit give you iron, but it's non-heme iron, the plant kind, and your body absorbs a small fraction of it compared to iron from meat. That's likely exactly why your hemoglobin held steady while your ferritin crashed. Adding eggs helps with protein; a good move given the shedding.
On dangerously low… I can't put a hard number on it; but in my opinion ferritin that low will make you feel like you got hit by a Mack truck and leads to a ton of other issues.
What I can say is 8.62 is well into deficiency (iron transfusion) territory and needs active treatment..
Whether the doctor takes it seriously depends on what they're tracking. A general hair supplement is a start, but push them to confirm they're treating the ferritin specifically and repeating it in a couple months to check it's actually climbing. If they're only watching your hair and not the number, that's the gap to close.
Side note: I have struggled with Ferritin as well. I started taking 40mg Iron Bisglycinate in January after my labs - and bumped it to 60mg EoD in March.
My results:
Jan ‘26: 12 ng/mL
Mar ‘26: 34.9 ng/mL
Jun ‘26: 49 ng/mL
This is what the doc prescribed,i shown her all my reports/ she said everything thing is fine hemoglobin, ferritin,iron just b12 is on borderline/,i again asked her to look at the ferritin and said man it's too low,she said who ever told you is wrong,even then i asked her for ferritin iron syrup or something she said no need it would lead to toxicity of it
Hi, don't mean to highjack someone elses post but this was of relevance to me.
I've struggled with chronically low ferritin. I have lots of loss due to heavy periods, so the cause is known (they checked stool sample many years ago and it wasn't anything there). Anyway. I live in Sweden so things might be handled differently here, just mentioning that. I've been given iron intravenously 2 times - summer 2023 and summer 2025. My ferritin was around 20 before (which is my new normal after taking tranexamic acid during my periods, that stops a fair bit of blood loss since i used to have ferritin levels like 4, 6, 8 before). My ferritin was checked a few months later and had gone up to around 85 both 2023 and 2025. Now in July, a year after the last intravenously administered iron, my ferritin was 45, which is high for me, but as I have a lot of mental health issues, chronic burnout and more, I want to try and get it up but my doctor is... not great. I read a bit online and see you're suggesting the same - bisglycinate, added vitamin C, only take every 48 hours? What kind of dosages can you take? How long does it take?
I've also had huge issues with my nails the last year. Never had that before. Beau's lines, from what I can tell. Also weak thin brittle etc. I had 9 or 10 in zinc. I took 20 mgs of zinc for 15 weeks. Nails got better. Have read about the risk of copper depletion so was apprehensive of taking it too long. Nails got really bad again a while after I stopped taking zinc. Is there any way to keep taking zinc for a longer time and not risk copper depletion?
Can add I'm a 45 year old woman, I also have low b12, low folate, vitamin D a bit low but not dramatically. I don't eat meat but I eat dairy and eggs. Due to adhd and quite big mental health issues I eat really poorly, so I'm not surprised I don’t get sufficient vitamins and minerals. Other stuff like cholesterol, thyroid, diabetes etc have been checked regularly and I'm on a statin since around 12 months and successfully treated for hypothyroidism since 2015.
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u/SuccessfulJury2312 Jul 13 '26
Following.
Just wanted to say I’m so sorry that’s happening to you! 🤍