TUCSON, Mar 6, 2009 (UPI via COMTEX) -- Personal nutrition coach and U.S.
nutrition author Jack Challem is challenging a recent study on high doses of
vitamin C interfering with chemotherapy drugs.
Challem, a Tucson, Ariz., personal nutrition coach and a regular contributor to
the journal Alternative and Complementary Therapies, challenges the findings of
a study published in Cancer Research which concludes that vitamin C given to
mice or cultured cells treated with common anticancer drugs reduces the
tumor-fighting effects of the chemotherapeutic agents.
Challem points out two main problems with the study -- the oxidized form of
vitamin C, or dehydroascorbic acid, and not actual vitamin C, ascorbic acid, was
used; and in the mouse experiments, the animals were given toxic doses of
dehydroascorbic acid, a compound that is not used as a dietary supplement in
humans.
"This study and the subsequent headlines were a grievous disservice to
physicians and patients with cancer," Challem writes in the Medical Journal
Watch column in Alternative and Complementary Therapies.
"Considerable positive research ... has shown striking benefits from high-dose
vitamin C (ascorbic acid) in cancer cells and animals -- and in actual human
beings."
High-dose intravenous vitamin C is a common form of alternative and
complementary therapy for patients receiving chemotherapeutic drugs and is
believed to help bring about tumor cell death, Challem says. In addition, it may
promote post-surgical healing by enhancing collagen formation, and increase
tissue resistance to tumor spread.
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