Posted by Larry Hoover on October 26, 2003, at 10:35:34
In reply to Vitamin C maximum dosage for important lack ???, posted by Frog on October 26, 2003, at 9:25:26
> Hello ,
>
> In the case of important lack of vitamin C , I would like to know what is the maximum dosage we can take before having any potential problems , I also wish to know how long does it take for the body to retrieve a normal vitamin c rate after taking high dosage of vitamin C (still in the case of big lack of vitamin C).There are two ways that vitamin C enters the body from the digestive tract, active transport and passive diffusion. The first, the active uptake, is readily saturated by high doses. In other words, there's a limited capacity for absorption by this route, perhaps 100 mg/day. At the dose you're taking, it's been estimated that maybe as much as 50% of the excess (when the active transporter is saturated) might simple diffuse into the blood.
The amount that stays in the digestive tract is an irritant. It's generally accepted that doses of 3 grams per day or more may cause diarrhea, but you can build up tolerance over time. I know people who take much more than that, but I don't know if that's a good idea. Your body can become very wasteful when the supply of vitamin C is overly abundant, and you can get what's called reactive scurvy if you suddenly decrease the supply.
> I suffer from major depression which main symptoms are : extreme psychic fatigue, nearly impossibility to concentrate, energyless 24/7. I have tried nearly all current existing classes of antidepressant (Prozac, Seroxat, Vivalan, Effexor, Ixel, Anafranil, Desipramine, Marsilid) during a sufficient amount of time (4 weeks and even 6 weeks in some cases (Anafranil, Desipramine, Marsilid) with reaching maximum dosage allowed , but noone has ended in a success (even partial).
That's unfortunate.
> I did some analysis (one year ago) which has shown an abnormal cortisol secretion in my body but this abnormality was not confirmed in recent analysis I did. However , those same analysis (two weeks ago) show that my vitamin C rate is really low compared to normal rate :
>
> My rate : under 3.0 µmol/l
> Normal rate : 26.1 to 84.6 µmol/lThat's a serious deficiency. Did you have your kidney function checked, too? Your kidneys might be wasting nutrients.
> The problem doesn't come from food since it is well balanced .You could have malabsorption.
> I am currently taking 2g/day of vitamin C (1g in the morning and the other one in the evening) from the advice of my endocrinologist and I have not seen any enhancement of my state since the beginning (18 days) I am about to see my endocrinologist soon and in the mean time I wish to have information regarding maximum dosage that body can take in the case of the important lack of vitamin c is not caused by food problem .
There are three possible reasons I can think of why your blood concentration of vitamin C has not come up.
1. kidney problems....your kidneys are not protecting vitamin C from excretion in urine.
2. malabsorption....as from celiac sprue, or other inflammatory intestinal disorder.
3. the timing of the bloodwork, relative to the dose of vitamin C. It's possible that your tissues are so starved for vitamin C that most of it has already been taken up from the blood before the blood test is done.I'm guessing.
If you don't get diarrhea from it, there's no reason not to try increasing your daily intake of vitamin C even further.
> If you have any informations regarding this subject ,please feel free to express yourself, thanks
>
>
> Regards,
> Pierre
>I know English is not your first language, but there is a very complete reference here:
http://books.nap.edu/books/0309069351/html/95.html#pagetop
Good luck,
Lar
poster:Larry Hoover
thread:273596
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/alter/20031023/msgs/273606.html