Vitamin C (also called L-ascorbic acid or ascorbate) is a nutrient that humans must get from food or dietary supplements since it cannot be made in the body. Vitamin C is an antioxidant and helps prevent oxidative stress. It also works with enzymes to play a key role in making collagen.
The earliest experience of using high-dose IV vitamin C was by a Scottish surgeon, Ewan Cameron, and his colleague, Allan Campbell, in the 1970s. This work led to collaboration between Cameron and the Nobel Prize–winning chemist Linus Pauling, further promoting the potential of vitamin C therapy in cancer management. The results clearly indicate that this simple and safe therapy is of definite value in the treatment of patients with advanced cancer.
A severe deficiency (lack) of vitamin C in the diet causes scurvy, a disease with symptoms of extreme weakness, lethargy, easy bruising, and bleeding. The lack of vitamin C in patients with scurvy makes collagen thinner in texture; when vitamin C is given, collagen becomes thicker again.
When taken by intravenous (IV) infusion, vitamin C can reach much higher levels in the blood than when it is taken by mouth. Studies suggest that these higher levels of vitamin C may cause the death of cancer cells in the laboratory. High-dose vitamin C has been studied as a treatment for patients with cancer since the 1970s.
High-dose vitamin C may be given by intravenous (IV) infusion (through a vein into the bloodstream) or orally (taken by mouth). When taken by intravenous infusion, vitamin C can reach much higher levels in the blood than when the same amount is taken by mouth.
We all know that Vitamin C is a powerful antioxidant with abundant benefits including immune enhancement, protection from viruses and bacteria, cardiovascular protection, eye diseases and even skin wrinkles. What many people may not know, however, is that in high-dose IV Vitamin C, can kill cancer cells.
Put simply, Vitamin C works with metals in the body to create hydrogen peroxide. Whereas normal cells have the ability to reduce the effects of hydrogen peroxide, cancer cells do not. The high concentration of the resulting hydrogen peroxide damages the DNA of the cancer cells, cuts off their energy supply and kills them. Vitamin C, even in very high doses, is toxic only to the cancer cells without harming the healthy cells in your body.
Animal studies have shown that high-dose vitamin C treatment blocks tumor growth in certain models of pancreatic, liver, prostate, and ovarian cancers, sarcoma, and malignantmesothelioma.
Some human studies of high-dose IV vitamin C in patients with cancer have shown improved quality of life, as well as improvements in physical, mental, and emotional functions, symptoms of fatigue, nausea and vomiting, pain, and appetite loss.
Intravenous high-dose ascorbic acid has caused very few side effects in clinical trials.
