Folic acid is the man-made form of vitamin B9, or folate, which your body uses for purposes that include normal brain function, DNA and RNA production and cell and tissue growth during pregnancy, infancy and adolescence. This vitamin is available in multivitamin or B complex supplements, as well as in foods that are folic acid-enriched.
Enriched Foods
Womenshealth.gov, a website of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office on Women's Health, lists types of folic acid-enriched food that include flour, bread, breakfast cereals, white rice, cornmeal and pasta. Some brands of breakfast cereal contain 100 percent of a normal adult dose of folic acid. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention list examples of these brands that include General Mills' Wheat Chex and Raisin Bran, Kellog's All Bran and Special K and Quaker Oats' Cinnamon Life and Cap'n Crunch. To determine the specific folic acid content of a given food, check its accompanying nutritional label. In some cases, food manufacturers may list the folic acid content of their products as folate.
Recommended Intake
Adults and teenagers over the age of 13 need 400 mcg of dietary folic acid per day, according to the University of Maryland Medical Center, or UMMC. If you are pregnant, you need 600 mcg per day. Nursing women need 500 mcg of folic acid per day. Children between the ages of 9 and 13 need 300 mcg per day, while children between the ages of 4 and 8 need 200 mcg; children between the ages of 1 and 3 need 150 mg. Infants between the ages of 7 and 12 months need 80 mcg of folic acid per day, while infants between birth and 6 months need 65 mcg per day.
Insufficient Intake
Your body utilizes man-made folic acid better than the natural folate found in foods such as beans, whole grains, leafy greens and citrus, Womenshealth.gov reports. Still, even if you eat properly and include folic acid-enriched food in your diet, you may not obtain adequate amounts of the vitamin. This is especially true for women, who frequently do not get enough folic acid from natural or enriched sources. For these reasons, Womenshealth.gov recommends that women take a multivitamin or B complex vitamin that contains folic acid.
Increased Need
You may have an increased need for folic acid if you take medications for type 2 diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, asthma, epilepsy, rheumatoid arthritis or lupus, WomensHealth.gov notes. You may also have an increased need if you undergo dialysis treatment for kidney disease, or have celiac disease, liver disease or sickle cell anemia. Additionally, your folic acid needs may increase if you regularly drink more than one serving of alcohol per day.
Considerations
Folic acid use is typically safe at recommended levels, the UMMC reports. However, unusually high intake of the vitamin can trigger side effects that include skin reactions, seizures, sleep disturbances or stomach difficulties. Do not take more than 800 mcg of folic acid per day---whether from enriched food, supplements or combined sources---without your doctor's explicit advice. Intake at this level can potentially mask the presence of dangerous vitamin B12 deficiencies.
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