Dual-form Oral Vitamin C
What is it?New research in the UK and the USA has shown that a combination of two forms of vitamin C, taken by mouth, can achieve the high blood levels thought necessary to have an anti-cancer effect, which we previously thought only possible with large intravenous doses. We have worked with the researchers to bring this to patients. Please be clear; there are as yet no clinical trials of this regime in cancer patients; it is not “evidence-based medicine” (there are two clinical trials of intravenous vitamin C going on at present, that we know about). This page is to give you the background to the treatment. Full instructions will only be given at a consultation. BackgroundThe use of vitamin C (ascorbic acid) in cancer is the legacy of Linus Pauling, twice Nobel Prize winner, who with Abram Hoffer invented the term “orthomolecular” for therapies using molecules that are familiar to the body. In the 1970’s Pauling published, with Scottish surgeon Ewan Cameron, two studies [1,2] reporting that terminal cancer patients given 10 grams of vitamin C per day lived longer and had better quality of life. It is important to note that in these studies the vitamin C (intravenous at first, then oral) was used alongside surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Of the two studies at the Mayo Clinic [3,4] which have been claimed to refute the Pauling/Cameron hypothesis, one used vitamin C alone as the treatment, and the other gave it after chemotherapy had finished. |
At these doses (less than we use now), a major role for vitamin C will be supporting the immune system, and this is known to be damaged by chemotherapy. And Pauling and Cameron never recommended using vitamin C as the sole treatment; their papers referred to “supportive treatment”. Pauling and Cameron also gave the vitamin C intravenously at first, unlike the Mayo studies. More recently, studies at the USA National Institutes of Health came to the conclusion that it was only possible to achieve the high blood levels of vitamin C necessary to kill cancer cells by giving it intravenously [5]. But new research shows that it is possible to achieve these high blood levels by giving a combination of two forms of vitamin C by mouth –the “ordinary” water-soluble vitamin plus a new, liposomal (oil-based) form [6]. The two forms appear to be absorbed into the body by different routes, adding up to give a much higher level. Some numbersThe kidneys will try to conserve vitamin C so the blood level does not go below about 70uM/L (micromoles per litre), and a daily intake of around 200mg is all it takes to maintain this level, which was originally thought to be a “saturation” level. Large oral doses (of “ordinary” vitamin C) will bring the level to 200 to 250uM/L, and this was thought to be highest level that could be achieved, except by large intravenous injections. |