Vitamin C linked to survival benefit in pre-leukemia patients — SkimNews
Get the Health newsletter
Daily health & science — research, biotech, public health, the studies worth knowing. Free.
- EVITA phase 2 trial randomized 109 patients with CCUS or MDS — conditions that can progress to acute myeloid leukemia — to 1,000 mg daily oral vitamin C or placebo for 12 months, with vitamin C recipients experiencing fewer adverse events and favorable shifts in immune-signaling cytokines.
- Exploratory survival analysis showed vitamin C patients were significantly more likely to be alive after roughly three years of follow-up than placebo recipients, although the supplement did not significantly slow the expansion of abnormal blood cells.
- Study design was the first randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of oral vitamin C in pre-leukemia and lower-risk myeloid conditions — earlier work had focused on intravenous vitamin C in solid tumors.
- More than half of participants entered the trial with insufficient vitamin C levels, and blood concentrations normalized in those assigned to supplementation, per results published in the American Cancer Society journal CANCER.
- Van Andel Institute–Stand Up To Cancer Epigenetics Dream Team researchers, led by Kirsten Grønbæk at the University of Copenhagen and Peter A. Jones at Van Andel Institute, conducted the trial across Copenhagen University Hospital–Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University Hospital–Herlev, Aalborg University Hospital, and Keck Hospital of USC.
- Mechanism centers on the TET2 enzyme, frequently mutated in leukemia — vitamin C supports TET2-driven regulation of gene activity, with the strongest protective effects in lab models appearing before cancer is fully established, framing the work as 'cancer interception.'
- Grønbæk cautioned that the survival finding is exploratory and must be confirmed in a larger phase 3 trial before any clinical recommendation is made.
Why it matters: For CCUS and MDS patients — who often face a 'watch and wait' standard because age or comorbidities rule out stem cell transplant — a 1,000 mg daily oral vitamin C regimen tested in EVITA offers a cheap, over-the-counter candidate intervention, but the survival signal is exploratory (not the primary endpoint) and a phase 3 trial is required before any change to clinical practice.
Ask SkimNews
