Vitamin B12 is essential for red blood cell production and healthy brain function. Learn about the benefits, symptoms of deficiency, and how to test for Vitamin B12 deficiency at Ganesh Diagnostic and Imaging Centre.
Vitamin B12 deficiency happens when your body is not getting enough vitamin or not absorbing enough vitamin B12 from the food that you’re eating that it needs to function properly. If you're untreated, vitamin B12 deficiency can cause physical, neurological and psychological problems. Vitamin B12 is an important nutrient that helps your body to make red blood cells and DNA(the genetic material in all of your cells).
Vitamin B12 helps to keep your hair, nails, and skin healthy. As your body is unable to make B12, you have to get it from foods of animal origin, like meat, or from supplements.
What are the benefits of Vitamin 12?
- Vitamin B12 helps to make red blood cells (RBC’s), white blood cells (WBC’s), and platelets.
- As every day, about 1% of your red blood cells are destroyed and replaced with new so, new red blood cells need vitamin B12 and folate (vitamin B9) to grow and develop.
- If vitamins are lacking, the process of making DNA will be turned hard, causing the immature red blood cells to die. This leads to anemia.
- In some studies it is proven that Vitamin B12 can lower the risk of osteoporosis (a disease that weakens your bones) and hip fractures.
- Vitamin B12 helps to reduce depression.
- It also helps in your skin enhancement.
What If I’m lacking Vitamin B12?
- If you have a very low level of Vitamin B12, you might experience hyperpigmentation (dark spots) on your skin, vitiligo (light patches on your skin), mouth ulcers, eczema, and acne.
- You might feel hair loss.
- Because of the low level of vitamin B12, your nails may turn brown-gray or bluish.
- This can lead to a loss of vision.
- You might feel memory loss, concentration and other related issues if you’re lacking with the Vitamin B12 nutrient.
What are the vitamin B12 enriched-foods?
- Meat
- Fish
- Poultry
- Fortified breakfast cereals
- Fortified breads
- Nutritional yeasts
- Fortified plant milks
- Milk
- Eggs
What are the symptoms of Vitamin B12 deficiency?
- Weakness, tiredness.
- Loss of appetite
- Heart palpitations
- shortness of breath
- Pale skin
- Numbness
- Muscle weakness
- Problems in walking or speaking
- Vision loss
- A painful, smooth, inflamed tongue
- Constipation, Diarrhea, or gas
- Bluish or gray-brown nails.
What can be the causes of Vitamin B12 deficiency in your body?
- Insufficient diet: Not taking enough or a healthy diet can cause a deficiency of vitamin B12.
- Digestive Disease: They can affect and cause the lack of vitamin B12 in your body.
- Overconsumption of alcohol can harm your digestive system which can lack the vitamin B12 in the body.
Diagnosis of Vitamin deficiency and other related test you should book now-
- Blood tests (Book Now)
- Complete blood count (Book Now)
- Serum Vitamin B12 (Book Now)
- Vitamin Screening (Book Now)
- Vitamin D screen test (Book Now)
- Vitamin K (Book Now)
Conclusion
Vitamin B12 is very crucial as it helps for making DNA, red blood cells and platelets. Lack of vitamin B12 in your body can affect your bones, hair, skin, nails, energy level, mood, and memory as well. You can get it naturally from animal products like meat and dairy. A vegetarian or vegan diet person may lack B12. But they can get it from B12 supplements or fortified cereals and breads.
FAQS-
Q. What is the relation of Vitamin B12 in pregnancy?
With the lack of vitamin B12, your baby could have faced developmental delays and not thrive the way he/she should. It’s important for brain and spinal development in babies.
Q. What can be the serious consequences of lack of vitamin B12?
Vitamin B12 deficiency can cause physical, neurological and psychological problems
Q. Why choose GDIC for your scans and tests?
- We provide high standard quality services to our patients.
- Free home sample collection services.
- We also offer facilities of online reporting.
- Our labs are NABL+ NABH certified.
- Facility of emergency test services at night.
- Affordable Diagnostic lab with up to 50% discount on many tests.
- We are open 24X7 and 365 days.
- Lakhs of satisfied customers.
- We are also open on Sundays.
- Facility of latest cutting-edge technologies.
- Highly Skilled Radiologists and Pathologists
