VITAMIN C - Good or Bad combined with Chemotherapy?

Over the past 10 years there has been some debate over the pros and cons of Vitamin C supplementation and its effect on cancer patients. Vitamin C is an antioxidant which has been suggested by some researchers to promote general cell health. However some chemotherapeutic drugs produce oxygen free radicals, which promote the killing of cancer cells. Therefore, Vitamin C could potentially interfere with these oxygen free radicals out to kill cancer cells, and promote cancer cell survival instead. A recent study published in the journal, Cancer Research and conducted at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, suggests that Vitamin C supplements and chemotherapy are not good in combination in cancer patients. They found that Vitamin C reduced the efficacy of many cancer drugs studied in animals and laboratory studies. The principal investigator, Mark Heaney, M.D. Ph.D., stated that Vitamin C protects the cancer cells from chemotherapy drugs by protecting their mitochondria, or "power source" of a cell. The study found that Vitamin C decreased the effect of all of the chemotherapy drugs they studied. The laboratory studies showed that Vitamin C decreased the effectiveness of the chemotherapeutic drugs anywhere from 30-70% depending on the dosage of the Vitamin C and chemo drug used. The Chemotherapeutic drugs studied included, Adriamycin, Platinol, Oncovin, Methotrexate, and Gleevec. The purpose of the study was to determine if Vitamin C supplements may cause more harm than good in cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy treatments. The research team measured the effects of both a pre-treatment group with the use of Vitamin C and a non pre-treatment group, on cancer cells in the lab, and the efficacy of the chemotherapeutic drug. The study team found that the Vitamin C didn't neutralize the effect of the chemotherapy drug, but it did blunt or decrease the effect of the drug by 30% up to 70%. They also implanted cancer cells into mice and found that pre-treated Vitamin C tumors grew faster than non pre-treated tumors. The cancer types studied in the trial were for leukemia and lymphoma cell types only. The study suggests that Vitamin C may cause more harm than good in certain cancers that are treated by certain chemotherapeutic agents. These findings may be important when considering holistic medicine and antioxidant approaches for patients with certain cancers and potential chemotherapeutic treatment regimens.