Vitamin C IV therapy - Kansas Medical Center study - Has anyone tried this?

Asked a much published and forever reaserching Prof friend of mine to check Drisko research. Below his response :

Drisko's work..not at all impressive..the animal studies from Michael Levine (NIH) are very weak.. this has been around since 2005..some publication in human cancer would have been published by now, had real effects been observed...

  So..I would not advise pursuing this route

 

for what it's worth always seeking better mouse trap too,

Sara

Tethys41 said:

UHC - and more information

The good news is that I have my insurance through UHC as well, and they have been very good at paying for these. I was getting it thorugh my port, thus the port access code.  There's really nothing on my claims that indicate this is an IV of vitamin C, just an IV to address the codes you indicated.  I don't know if they would balk if they knew what was in it.

There's information regarding case studies involving IVC at this website:

http://www.riordanclinic.org/search/?q=IV+vitamin+C

As far as being effective in controlling any individual's cancer, it will depend on what is driving the tumor.  IVC is very effective as an antioxidant, and yes it is fine to use antioxidants during chemo as long as it is timed correctly.  It is also beneficial if the tumor is driven by VEGF, or angiogenesis.  If the imbalances that are driving the tumor are not ones address by IVC, it will certainly be less effective at fighting the tumor, but it will help protect normal cells from chemo, regardless.

 

Regarding the port code with UHC, they told us this code used to be billable, but is no longer.   I hope this doesn't effect the reimbersment amount too much.     We shall see.  If you have a more recent experience where the code is actually payed, please do let me know and we will ask for another person to talk to (sometimes wrong information is given out by UHC to us)

Do you think your cancer was diminished greatly by Vit C IV, or do you have a feeling it just supported your immunity and other factors contributed to the cancer reduction mostly?   just curious.

Thanks again

Jim

Tethys41 said:

For me

Jim,

For me, personally, I think the IVC was a life saver.  My debulking surgery was suboptimal, and my surgeon gave me less than a year to live, with little possibility of remission.  I achieved remission 8 months after my surgery and have been NED for over 3 years.  I feel the IVC helped to make remission possible for me.  I do still get regular doses of IVC.  After the fact, I've learned that VEGF is a big factor in my body and was driving the tumor.  Therefore, I believe it helped in my outcome.  I also was able to receive two additional doses of chemo, because the IVC was keeping me strong.  My CA-125 continued to drop during the two additional chemos, and it has since never gone back up to the level it was prior to those two additional doses. 

Tethys, thanks for your additional impressions.   On Inspire and other places, I have read about people who have responded so well to it, but others who have not.    One lady didn't respond to chemo, but Vit C literally was the chemo agent for her that put her in remission.    I do see the efficacy is quite variable, but with the common base-line supportive effects.

The fact you were able to take those two extra doses....was indeed likely critical.    My wife didnt know about Vit C at the time of front-line.....and ever since the first chemo, the CA125 has not come back to full "normal"  due to toxicity effects of chemo.   Consequently cancer has become increasingly resistant to treatment as overall health has declined.      If she could have tolerated it more initially for complete response, and a couple extra chemo rounds, things may have been different.   

It is too early to see how Vit C is working on my wife now (1.5 weeksand 5 doses.... Unfortunately, Avastin had little effect on her.... and that is a strong VEGF targeted therapy.   So, from that standpoint, perhaps it shouldn't work.      We are/were hoping for some direct cytotoxic effects of Vit C therapy in conjunction with a CDK 4,6 inhibitor she is on now.

Thanks again

Tethys41 said:

BioFocus

Jim,

I think the best approach for some patients, especially those who are facing more chemo, or are not responding well to it, is the BioFocus test.  It is a blood test conducted in Germany on a blood sample shipped to their lab.  It will identify not only the most effective chemotherapy choices for a particular patient, but will also identify the most effective integrative therapies for that individual as well.  My naturopath has been using the test for many years.  My gyn/onc's colleague has just started ordering it for some of her patients, as she has seen the effectiveness of the results the test yields. 

Hi Tethys

We were about to pull the trigger on a test from RGCC (Greek Test), but lost some faith in their external customer relations and lack of follow-up with our inquiries.   Plus, information I learned through research scientists that have been helping us at Clearity, suggest that RGCC may not work for Ovarian.   In particular, EpCAM is a marker they screen CTC for in the blood.     However, OVC cells rarely express EpCAM, thus even if they were circulating, detection of them is unlikely using this process.   

Do you know if EpCAM is also used at BioFocus?    Does BioFocus work with insurance, like UHC?

Thanks so much for the new idea!

Jim

Tethys41 said:

Biofocus

Jim,

I can't answer your question about EpCAM directly, but what I can tell you is that the bulk of my naturopath's patients are ovarian cancer patients, and she uses this test on many of them.  That being said, however, I do know that occasionally a patient's test results come back inconclusive because the lab was unable to locate and CTCs in the sample.  The bulk of patients she uses this test on, however, do get results from the lab.  I only know of one patient, who has had this test paid for by insurance, and that is the one who saw my gyn/onc's collegue and she ordered the test for the patient.  I think whether insurance may cover the test, or not, is based on who orders it for the patient.  That particular patient has also had IPT chemo paid for, because her doctor ordered that treatment, based on the results of the Biofocus test.  The Clearity test does not test the patient's cell reponse to any therapies.  They do a molecular profile of the cells in the tumor and cross check it with their database.  From that information, they choose a chemo protocol based on what most patients with that molecular profile have responded to in the past.  Either way, I think it is important to identify what is contributing to tumor growth in the patient.  These issues need to be addressed to help the body heal and to stay healthy.  If you successfully remove the tumor, regardless of the approach, and do not adjust body imbalances, the cause of the cancer has not been addressed, which increases the risk of recurrance.

 

 

 

Thanks for the info on Biofocus.   Mentioning Clearity was not to compare the two approaches, but to say that they have some extremely knowledgeable PhDs working there...that actually understand this stuff better than I do. Wife used them for first recurrence therapy.    They also care so much about patients that they don't deploy coin operated email screeners for their patients, so they are accessible.    They have been helpful in explaining some of this in the past (RGCC for instance), and I am awaiting some feedback now on this test.  As to the tests they farm out, they use Caris Lifescienes among others for the actual testing.     For my wife, there is no current sample that has relevance to test --- so this is why this blood test has some additional appeal currently.

Good news about Insurance possibly paying.  I will work with our Drs to see if they can get this going...addreses some of the risk of unknown efficacy.   I did send an email to Dr Prix at Biofocus, but no reply yet.   Thanks again.

pinky104 said:

Vitamin C

I had stage IV uterine serous papillary carcinoma almost 3 years ago.  I took oral vitamin C in large doses (3000 mg. a day) to prevent cancer for about 15 years or so before I developed cancer.  It apparently didn't help a bit as I still got it.  I realize this isn't the same as the IV vitamin C you're discussing.  However, I want to warn you that vitamin C causes you to store iron.  Three months after completing chemo, I was still short of breath.  My family doctor checked my blood count and said my hemoglobin wasn't low enough to be causing my shortness of breath.  He decided to check my ferritin level.  It was 962 when it should have been no more than 150.  When I went back to my oncologist (who's also a hematologist) for my three month check-up, he did a genetic test for hemochromatosis.  He found I had one abnormal gene, not the two abnormal genes that usually cause hemochromatosis. He still decided I had hemochromatosis with a cause that has yet to be discovered.  I just want to warn everyone that since hemochromatosis is in a small percentage of the population and most people don't even know they it, they should beware of taking too much vitamin C.  hemochromatosis can actually cause certain types of cancer. It apparently isn't suspected of causing the type of cancer I had, but I had to have an MRI to rule out damage to my organs from the excess iron. Other than a benign-appearing liver cyst, nothing was found on me, thank God!

Appreciate the tip/info....something to be on the watch for.