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Niceotropic t1_j95t7vb wrote

To be clear, you're not missing anything, there is no difference between "pharmacological vitamin C" and vitamin C. They are both ascorbic acid.

The motivations for using this obfuscating term are unsupported in the text and make no sense.

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RepresentativeFox149 t1_j95ukh9 wrote

Emphasis added.

“The intracellular VC concentration is strictly regulated in order to maintain levels of 80–100 μM in the plasma [2, 3]. However, intravenous injection bypasses this strict regulation, allowing specific VC concentrations to be maintained within a specified period, thereby providing a pharmacological basis for its therapeutic application [4]. Several pioneering studies have demonstrated the efficacy of pharmacological VC in improving the survival of patients with advanced cancers [5, 6]. In contrast, two randomized double-blind controlled trials failed to demonstrate any benefit of VC against advanced malignant disease [7, 8]. Therefore, the route of administration is important for high-dose VC to have a therapeutic effect, and only intravenous administration results in sufficiently high plasma and urine concentrations to allow potential antitumor activity [9].”

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Niceotropic t1_j95y6z8 wrote

Then its intravenous nature should be what is described. IV ascorbic acid is not new, nor were the pharmacokinetics of IV ascorbic acid a mystery.

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Pretty-Theory-5738 t1_j973pod wrote

Technically you could also deliver a low dose intravenously as well, so that’s not really a complete descriptor either. A more clear descriptor for a lay audience might be “high dose intravenous”.

But this actually still misses a small nuance, which can be understood once we know the context of how scientists tend to use the jargon of “pharmacological dose”. In bio research, we use this term mainly in contrast with “biological dose”. A biological dose refers to something relatively within the range of what could occur naturally within the body, through food consumption and/or the body’s creation of that chemical, depending on which chemical we’re talking about.

A ‘pharmacological dose’ is something significantly higher than what would occur naturally in the body. In this case with vitamin C, it’s more possible to achieve a “pharmacological dose” through IV (although with many other chemicals you can achieve a “pharmacological” dose orally if there’s not much restriction on absorption). Anyways, the point is that even saying “high dose” is not fully informative, because the scientist could be referring to just a high ‘biological dose’. Saying pharmaceutical dose gives a nod to the relative scale of the dose that we’re talking about.

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Niceotropic t1_j97qcsj wrote

High dose intravenous would be good for the informed audience. Pharmacological is a superficial meaningless superlative term in this context.

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Innundator t1_j96ievd wrote

Your argument is that there should be no differentiation between a rock containing iron, and an actual hammer composed entirely of iron. Because it'd be confusing to call them both anything but iron.

The difference between a pharmacological dose and what's found in an orange is many orders of magnitude, which warrants a new term.

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Time8u t1_j96r9dw wrote

No new term is needed. It should be called "intravenous" vitamin C. Calling it "pharmacological" is a way of making something that is concrete and simple abstract instead and whoever came up with it is intentionally trying to make this appear more sophisticated than it actually is.

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Innundator t1_j96y7ye wrote

You should tell the people doing the research! You're obviously more aware of how things work than they are, and that they haven't heard from you yet is really a travesty of science.

Why are you hiding your brilliance from the world

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Amesenator t1_j96f2f0 wrote

Is lypo spheric Vit C of potential utility in lieu of intravenous delivery?

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Kailaylia t1_j96txc2 wrote

>Liposomal-encapsulated Ascorbic Acid: Influence on Vitamin C Bioavailability and Capacity to Protect Against Ischemia–Reperfusion Injury
>
>The data indicate that oral delivery of 4 g of vitamin C encapsulated in liposomes produces circulating concentrations of vitamin C that are greater than unencapsulated oral but less than intravenous administration

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triffid_boy t1_j96kqfb wrote

Maybe but you should assume no, since this has not been tested in the above study.

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Zeratul_Artanis t1_j95vh2c wrote

They've made a distinction that intravenous Vit C I'd effective but oral isn't because absorption rates vary wildly.

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greyham11 t1_j95u1lk wrote

it seems to me theyre just trying to avoid saying "megadose"

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Zeratul_Artanis t1_j95vcuz wrote

No, they're saying oral isn't effective, but intravenous is.

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Niceotropic t1_j95y2xe wrote

Then this is of course the description that should have been used.

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Zeratul_Artanis t1_j95zmsm wrote

Well, no because the description is still correct. Pharmacological use of XYZ just means clinical controlled treatment of a disease using XYZ.

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KourteousKrome t1_j968xkw wrote

Yeah but if they say pharmacological it seems scary and naturopath blogs can’t say “eat an orange to cure cancer”

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Niceotropic t1_j96bjdz wrote

No, it’s not correct. Most pharmacological interventions are oral.

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Innundator t1_j96itzc wrote

Yes, random redditor, you tell those PhDs they're wrong about their field. You obviously would know!

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Justtryme90 t1_j97fd5t wrote

We are not infallible, even in niche topics which we are very highly experienced with.

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Innundator t1_j97l9hv wrote

Cool. That means terms we don't understand should be converted to ones we do, right?

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Justtryme90 t1_j97t6d3 wrote

No, it likely means you should spend more time learning how to read academic literature, or if you can't handle how it's written leave it to others who can.

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[deleted] t1_j95w92h wrote

[removed]

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harbison215 t1_j96ewvl wrote

It may be so that people don’t read the title and go to the store and start eating whole bottles of vitamin C?

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[deleted] t1_j96h7ni wrote

[removed]

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Niceotropic t1_j96fldc wrote

That kind of subjective advocacy has no place in a hard sciences paper.

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harbison215 t1_j96gxsw wrote

Maybe it means at intravenous dose that doesn’t really exist outside of medical settings? I’m not sure

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motus_guanxi t1_j96h9gu wrote

It’s literally bad fir your liver to eat that much at once..

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Kailaylia t1_j96rxtv wrote

>They are both ascorbic acid.

Most likely, in this case.

However, there are many forms of "pharmacological vitamin C". For example, calcium ascorbate, ascorbates of various other minerals, liposomal vitamin C and ascorbyl palmitate.

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