Why vitamins can ease chemo pain
The misery of chemotherapy could by eased for thousands of cancer patients by taking a vitamin pill, experts claimed yesterday.
Folic acid and vitamin B12 have been shown to drastically cut toxic side-effects of chemotherapy, including sickness and potentially fatal damage to the immune system.
Early results show doctors are able to give patients longer courses of treatment as a result, improving their quality of life and their chances of survival.
The discovery was made by a team of experts from Newcastle General Hospital, Newcastle University and the University of Colorado, working with drug firm Eli Lilly.
Their results were revealed at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting in San Francisco yesterday.
More than 450 patients - 50 from the UK - were tested. Half were given a daily dose of folic acid and a B12 injection every three weeks along with a new chemotheraphy drug, Alimta.
Tests showed the risk of nausea and immune damage in the patients with vitamin boosts fell from 40 per cent to ten per cent.
Four per cent of the group without the extra vitamins were killed not by the cancer, but by the poisoning from the chemotherapy. In the other group, the death toll was zero.
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