Aira Joy B.

Espaol HNF121- Term Paper

2013-32782 December 2, 2016

Reassessing the Effects of Vitamin Mega-dosing as Treatments of Various Diseases

Derived from DiPalma & McMichaels Assessing the Value of Meganutrient in Disease

Ones body would always take the backseat when it comes to priorities. This situation is

not a rare sight in this generationstudents not excluded. With a country where adults who are

busy providing bread and butter for their families tend to skip meals or settle for less nutritious

foods, and students who are away from home resort to eating in fast food chains or worse, do not

take a meal, are prone to nutrient deficiency and to tackle this problem, people usually take

vitamins and other food supplements to fill up the lack of other food components.

As per a normal persons knowledge, food and dietary supplements are good for the body

since it contains certain components that when absorbed in the body, facilitates specific bodily

functions. These products, little do consumers know, may pose risks and harm when not properly

took in, consumed in appropriate amountsspecially nowadays when other claims are arising

involving exceeding dosages of defined food components.

Food and dietary supplementswhich includes vitamins, minerals, some enzymes,

amino acids, and herbals; with vitamin D and E, calcium, and iron being those of the most

popularare starting to dominate markets since the said products suffice for the inadequate

nutrient intake. These commercially accessible products are available in variety of forms such as

tablets, capsules, powder, and even in the form of energy bars and drinks (Office of Dietary

Supplements, National Istitutes of Health, 2011). Included in some dietary supplements are

vitamins, defined as micronutrients that are in organic and serves an essential purpose for

regulated and proper growth and development of the body, are commonly used in nutritional

therapy (Price, 2015). These micronutrients being used for such important purpose have a huge

schism in term of the food components dosages.

Aira Joy B. Espaol HNF121- Term Paper
2013-32782 December 2, 2016

As per the two divisions, a group claims that an appropriate dosage must be observed

since too much of a certain vitamin may give harmful side-effects while another body would say

that much more intake of the certain micronutrient attains additional benefits.

According to an assessment, it is a practice to follow appropriate dosage stick close to the

specified value as much as possible for the sole reason that less might lead to deficiencies and

much more may cause toxicities (DiPalma & McMichael, 1981). To prevent such inappropriate

dosages, Recommended Energy and Nutrient Intakes (RENIs) have been established for

adequate intakes, it is defined by Food and Nutrition Research Institute (2002) as the:

levels of intakes of energy and essential nutrients which, on the basis of

current specific knowledge, are considered adequate for the maintenance of
health and well-being of nearly all healthy persons in the population.
In addition to this, Recommended Daily Intakes (RDI) should also be considered, which

often than not is not followed by the public since information were not really being paid

attention instead, misleading advertisements are disseminated; this then leads to numerous

complications: under- or over-dosing.

An article by Pandya (2007) pointed out that several preparations concerning wide range

of vitamin and other nutrient intakes are misleading. One example given was the use of the

prefix mega- which implied very large doses (1,000,000) that when compared to the RDIs of

such substances are far larger than the literature valueapproximately 72 times larger. The term

mega-dosing is inappropriate especially since the values for the clinical therapy and the

definition of mega- are not equivalent.

Mega doses are specifically used to cure some diseases such what is enumerated in the

table below which was derived from an assessment by DiPalma & McMichael (1981). In Table1,
Aira Joy B. Espaol HNF121- Term Paper
2013-32782 December 2, 2016

it can be seen that not any of the dosage exceeded or even attained the mega count or a million

in terms of amount thus, these mega-doses may be termed properly as pharmacological dosage

range of vitamins to avoid misleading terminologies.

Table1. Some mega doses of vitamins prescribed for various diseases.

Vitamin Disease RDA (adult Ave. daily Multiplicatio RDA x one
male), mg mega dose n factor meg (grams)
Thiamine Neurasthenia 1.4 100mg 72x 1400
Nicotinic Schizophrenia 18 3g 166x 18000
acid
Vitamin C Common cold; 60 2-12g 200x 60000
Cancer
Vitamin E Various 10 1g 100x 10000

These kinds of therapies have been popular ever since there appeared purported benefits

of large doses leading to several studies made use of the said method. Studies that utilized this

type of method includes the advance therapy of childhood blindness and acne with vitamin A

which was has a paper published under Olson (1972); vitamin D is used to cure rheumatoid

arthritis; lowering of blood lipids and curing peripheral vascular disease with pharmacological

dosage range of niacin and nicotinic acid. Unfortunately, these treatments, aside from rare

exemptions, are already proven to have little or no benefit, worst case scenario might cause

serious toxicities (DiPalma & Ritchie, 1977).

In addition to this, the use of vitamin C or ascorbic acid in treatment of bacterial and viral

infection, and adjuvant therapy for cancer was studied by Riordan, et al (2003) using intravenous

ascorbate in cancer patients. The process of infusion of ascorbic acid aimed to penetrate

malignant cells, imitating glucose, which will later on cause tumor cytotoxic plasma levels of

ascorbate to increase, hence tumor cell lysis. The disadvantage of the treatment is that non-

maintenance of the said treatment may cause rebound effect wherein the symptoms and
Aira Joy B. Espaol HNF121- Term Paper
2013-32782 December 2, 2016

complications of the nutrient deficiency is experienced after sudden stop of high dosage of the

specific nutrient.

Another case of mega dosage that was made popular was the use of niacin to treat

schizophrenia which was first observed in a set of patients with pellagra, hence termed as

orthomolecular therapy (Lipton, et al., 2009). The therapy was conceptualized in a way that the

large dosage of the micronutrient would drive definite metabolisms to a favorable direction just

like any hormone therapies since some other literatures show data wherein the large doses of

niacin would increase the efficiency of NAD-NADP and other metabolic functions to a more

beneficial path, instead the reverse was observed (Hoffer, 1972). The large doses of the

micronutrient became highly toxic to the liver which caused various complications including

abnormal functioning of the said organ, jaundice, gastric ulcer, pigmented hyperkeratosis,

flushing and pruritis, etc. (DiPalma & McMichael, 1981).

Lack of Clinical Effectiveness of Megadosage. In addition to these specific uses of

vitamin C, extensive literature has appeared on the application of this vitamin to a wide variety

of diseases. Many such claims are associated with megadosage treatment. However, sporadic

reports of the efficacy of vitamin C in curing cancer or the common cold have not been

substantiated. Any preventive benefit that might be derived from such use of ascorbic acid seems

small when weighed against the expense and the risks of the megadosage treatment. The latter

include formation of kidney stones resulting from the excessive excretion of oxalate, rebound

scurvy in the offspring of mothers taking high doses, and a similar phenomenon when subjects

who are consuming large amounts of vitamin C suddenly stop. These rebound phenomena

presumably are due to induction of pathways of ascorbic acid metabolism as a result of the

preceding high dosage (Marcus & Coulston, n.d.).

Aira Joy B. Espaol HNF121- Term Paper
2013-32782 December 2, 2016

As expected, RDIs and RENIs are there of a sole reason and for consumers to watch out

on what they take and to what certain amount since not knowing these basic nutrition

knowledges may lead to serious complications just like what the cases described above, even if

these were medical trials.

As seen in the examples aforementioned, these vitamins were prescribed in large amounts

to treat diseases that are cure-restricted or those diseases that are almost incurable or little cure is

available. One of the cures they have stumbled upon is the megadosage of different diseases

which were tried for some patients even in a just few literatures that may prove it; maybe to seek

more observations, too. Only that, with every good thing they expected, unfortunate side effects

come along with the treatments and those were very extreme, almost like a rebound

experiencing the same symptoms just like depriving oneself with the specific micronutrient, even

with the fact the patient is overdosing.

As mentioned in above statements, there is a desperate hunger for the medical bodies to

find even the very risky solutions that might provide even the thinnest thread for patients to hang

on for dear life. As of now, other forms of curing the given diseases are available in other

methods but assurance of the other methods vary so as their individual side-effects or

complications. It is for the patient to decide on how to take on those diseases.

Aira Joy B. Espaol HNF121- Term Paper
2013-32782 December 2, 2016

WORKS CITED

DiPalma, J. R., & McMichael, R. (1981). ASSESSING THE VALUE OF MEGANUTRIENT IN

DISEASE. Bull. N.Y. Acad. Med., 1-9.
DiPalma, J. R., & Ritchie, D. M. (1977). Vitamin Toxicity. Ann. Rev. Pharmacol. Toxicol., 17,
133-148.
Food and Nutrition Research Institute, Department of Science and Technology (FNRI-DOST).
(2002). Recommended Energy and Nutrient Intakes. Philippines: Food and Nutrition
Research Institute, Department of Science.
HUGH D. RIORDAN, e. a. (2003, September). Intravenous Ascorbic Acid: Protocol for its
Application and Use. CLINICAL SCIENCES: PRHSJ, 22(3), 287-290.
Lipton, M. A., Ban, T. A., Kane, F. J., Levine, J., Mosher, L. R., & Wittenborn, R. (2009).
MEGAVITAMIN AND ORTHOMOLECULAR THERAPY IN PSYCHIATRY. Washington,
D.C.: American Psychiatric Association.
Office of Dietary Supplements, National Istitutes of Health. (2011, June 17). DIETARY
SUPPLEMENTS: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW. Retrieved from U.S. Department of
Health & Human Services: https://ods.od.nih.gov
Pandya, N. (2007, April). Facts and Comparisons 4.0. Journal of the Medical Library
Association, 95(2), 217-219. Retrieved December 1, 2016, from
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
Price, C. (2015). Vitamania: Our obsessive quest for nutritional perfection. Chicago: Penguin
Random House Academic Marketing.