ARTICLE: Some Patients And Doctors Say Intravenous Vitamins Offer Relief

[Murray Charters <mcharters@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Some Patients And Doctors Say Intravenous Vitamins Offer Relief

By Lisa Marshall, Camera Staff Writer
September 29, 2003

Jack Butler did it after he was diagnosed with West Nile Virus last month ? he 
says his fever broke within 24 hours and
a week later he felt fine.

Lisa Schaeffer does it when she has a migraine that won't go away ? she says it 
stops the pain faster than any drug
she's tried, and it costs far less.

Richard Schwarz has done it twice a week for two months ? he says it helped him 
regain his strength after a chronic
intestinal disorder caused him to drop 40 pounds and faint from exhaustion.

It's fast, fairly cheap and it comes with almost no side-effects, patients and 
doctors say.

Yet 30 years after a Maryland physician named John Myers started giving sick 
patients mega-doses of vitamins and
minerals directly into their veins, intravenous vitamin therapy remains largely 
underused, proponents say.

"It's not patentable. There is no one out there who is going to make a lot of 
money on these ingredients, so it
remains, in a sense, underappreciated," says Dr. Pierre Brunschwig, of Helios 
Health Centers in Boulder.

At Helios, one of just a handful of medical clinics across the state to offer 
intravenous nutrient infusions, about six
patients a day drop by for a "Myers cocktail": an IV spiked with mega-doses of 
magnesium, vitamin C, calcium, B
vitamins and other nutrients that assist adrenal function.

Patients seek the treatment for everything from halting a migraine or asthma 
attack to warding off cardiovascular
disease or quelling chronic fatigue syndrome. A treatment costs $65 and lasts 
roughly 20 minutes. Aside from an
occasional sting and a bit of light-headedness, there are no side effects, 
Brunschwig says.

While Helios sticks with the Myers cocktail combination, some clinics use IV 
infusions of just vitamin C to treat
cancer patients. Research is also underway into treating multiple sclerosis, 
Parkinson's disease and macular
degeneration with various intravenous nutrients.

"There are a growing number of nutritionally based therapies that can be given 
intravenously," says Brunschwig.

So why not just eat a bunch of vitamins?

Brunschwig says nutritional deficiencies ? stemming from poor diet, high stress 
or diseases that interfere with vitamin
absorption ? can often cause or exacerbate health problems. To replace those 
nutrients orally can take months and cause
diarrhea.

Because IV therapy bypasses the digestive tract, patients can get up to 10 
times as much in one treatment as they could
take orally in a day. Quickly flooding the blood with nutrients drives them 
into the cells more efficiently than when
they must be absorbed over time, Brunschwig says.

"What might take six months to a year to do orally you might be able to achieve 
in just a few months," says Brunschwig.


Dr. Andrea Cohen, an associate professor at the University of Colorado Health 
Sciences Center in Denver, says she has
seen many small but promising studies examining intravenous vitamin C for 
cancer and IV magnesium for asthma, migraines
and angina. Overall, results on their effectiveness have been mixed. But if 
given properly, they appear to be safe, she
says.

She's intrigued, but not convinced.

"There are great anecdotal reports," she says. "It's time to do some larger 
studies in a rigorous controlled setting to
get some final answers."

More magnesium

At Helios, the key ingredient in the Myers cocktail is magnesium, an element 
responsible for roughly 300 body
processes, including the relaxation of smooth muscles that control blood 
vessels in the lungs, head and heart.

It's hard to get enough magnesium (found in nuts and dark leafy vegetables) 
through the diet, and the more stress we
have, the more we secrete in our urine, doctors say. Studies have linked 
magnesium deficiency to a host of acute health
problems related to spasms of smooth muscles, including asthma, migraines and 
angina. It also has been linked to many
persistent illnesses, such as chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia.

Brunschwig often tests patient magnesium levels and, if they are low, 
recommends a six- to eight-week IV program.

"If you have a magnesium deficiency, lots of body processes won't work. It's 
one of the dominoes that tips over in
chronic disease and it is hard to pick back up," Brunschwig says.

Niels Schonbeck, 57, comes to Helios weekly for a Myers cocktail to treat his 
borderline hypertension. He says he
always feels more energetic after a treatment, but it's too early to tell what 
the long-term impact will be.

"I'm going to try everything, because I want to avoid going on drugs," he says.

Lisa Schaeffer, 39, suffered excruciating 72-hour migraines for five years and 
went through numerous prescription pain
medications before discovering Helios.

On her first trip there, she was in the throes of a bad episode.

"I was throwing up, I couldn't deal with anything. My husband had to drive me," 
she says.

Within 10 minutes of the therapy, the pain was gone. "For anyone who has been 
through the traditional route of coping
with migraines, I would definitely recommend it," she says.

Emerging research

While proponents of intravenous vitamin therapies concede there is little 
research to back them up, that appears to be
changing.

Two recent studies published in the Annals of Emergency Medicine looked at 
urban emergency rooms that use IV magnesium
sulfate to treat migraines or asthma attacks. While falling short of a 
wholesale recommendation, both studies found the
treatment to be safe and beneficial.

Cohen, who heads up the complementary and alternative medicine research program 
at the CU Cancer Center, says she has
seen numerous studies suggesting that high doses of vitamin C, given 
intravenously, may help boost immune function and
slow tumor growth in cancer patients without causing side effects. Because 
there is some concern that the therapy may
interfere with other cancer treatments, she cautions anyone considering it to 
talk to their doctor first.

"There is not enough data to recommend that everyone go out and have this done 
right now, but further studies are being
done," Cohen says.

Denver Dr. Thomas Levy is so impressed with the curative powers of high-dose 
vitamin C he recently published a 450-page
book about it, including 1,200 references to scientific studies.

The book, "Vitamin C, Infectious Diseases, and Toxins; Curing the Incurable," 
(2002; Xlibris publishing) touts high-
dose Vitamin C as the "ideal agent for killing any infecting virus," including 
influenza, the common cold, pneumonia
and encephalitis.

Jack Butler, 67, is convinced. He went to Levy for intravenous vitamin C after 
falling ill with West Nile Virus and
says he felt better almost instantly.

"There is nothing to it ? no down side," he said. "If I were to get really sick 
again, it is one of the first things I
would do."

Contact reporter Lisa Marshall at (303) 473-1357 or marshalll@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

SOURCE: The Boulder Daily Camera, CO


* * *

----------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:listserv@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn