What Vitamins Do You Need When You Have Crohn’s Disease?

Crohn’s disease can really affect your wellness. Not only does it cause damage to your digestive tract, but this damage, and the surgery and medication used to treat it, can further affect your wellbeing because it can cause your body to be less capable of absorbing nutrients. However, Arthur DeCross MD, associate professor of medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Centre in Rochester, New York, says that you can still get what you need from your diet and a daily multivitamin.

Yet, depending on the amount and location of damage in the body, if you have Crohn’s disease you need to be on the lookout for shortages in vitamins and minerals. Firstly, if you experience bleeding in your intestines, you can lose a lot of iron from the blood loss, which leads to anaemia. If you’re noticing any signs of fatigue, headaches or pale skin, you should get tested for a red-blood-cell deficiency, which iron supplements can help with.

You may also have a vitamin B12 deficiency, because your disease can damage the part of your intestine, the ileum, which is responsible for absorbing this vitamin. According to DeCross, if you do have a B12 deficiency, supplements may not be enough, and you may need injections every month. Look of for symptoms such as weakness, fatigue, light-headedness, and in extreme cases, tingling or numbness in your fingers and toes and difficulty walking.

Your body may also have trouble absorbing calcium when you have Crohn’s disease, and DeCross says deficiencies in this mineral also occur from lactose intolerance, corticosteroid use and persistent active inflammation. Therefore, as this can increase your risk of early osteoporosis, Decross says that many Crohn’s patients ‘benefit from being on calcium and vitamin D to keep their bones strong.’

Finally, if you’re experiencing diarrhoea, anxiety, difficulty sleeping, nausea and vomiting and restless legs syndrome, Nirmal Kaur, MD, medical director of the Inflammatory Bowel Disease Centre at Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, says your body may be deprived of magnesium and potassium. Therefore, you might consider a supplement for these minerals, as you need them to keep your heart, muscles, and kidneys in good working order.