Most people are familiar with Iowa natives like Kurt Warner and Ashton Kutcher. No knock against them, they both have enjoyed great careers in their respective trades. But it’s an unfortunate aspect of our society that they are more well-known than Joseph Cullen. Dr. Cullen, a surgeon at the University of Iowa, is a hero to civilization. His work impacts the 19 million people around the globe that each year are diagnosed with cancer.

Dr. Cullen is leading the world in researching a low cost cancer treatment that has shown the potential to improve survival for many people  with this disease. He has demonstrated that high doses of Vitamin C delivered intravenously can boost the odds of surviving cancer while reducing the toxic effects of chemo and radiation. But he needs your support to continue this world changing progress.

Cancer Research in Iowa

The University of Iowa is home to the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center, one of the leading cancer research hospitals in the United States. Since 2001, they have been classified by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) as a “Comprehensive Cancer Center”. In 2009, Dr. Cullen launched the first clinical trial in Iowa to evaluate if high doses of intravenous Vitamin C (IVC) can safely help kill cancer in patients with an advanced disease. The initial results proved promising, justifying 8 more subsequent clinical trials.

No other institution in the world has conducted more Phase I and II clinical trials using Vitamin C to treat cancer. The encouraging evidence from these studies lead to Dr. Cullen receiving a $9.7 million grant from NCI in 2018 to fund further research into IVC for cancer treatment.

Overall, his studies have shown that IVC taken in combination with other current standard cancer treatments (e.g. chemo and/or radiation therapy) is more effective at killing cancer cells and improving overall survival. One study showed that IVC helped double overall survival for advanced cancer patients compared to those who did not take high doses of Vitamin C. Pursuing this research has not been easy. Using Vitamin C for cancer treatment has battled controversy since studies began in the 1970’s.

History of studying Vitamin C for cancer treatment

In the 1970’s clinical trials led by Dr. Ewan Cameron and Dr. Linus Pauling (a two-time Nobel Prize winner) showed encouraging results in the fight against cancer using Vitamin C. Their trials were focused on patients that were considered terminally ill with cancer, they found the terminal patients treated with intravenous Vitamin C lived 20 times longer and enjoyed a much greater quality of life than those that were not treated with high dose Vitamin C. An independent clinical trial in the early 1980’s conducted in Japan showed similar results.

The findings coaxed Charles Moertel of the Mayo Clinic to lead double-blind randomized trials to study the impact of intaking oral Vitamin C as a Cancer treatment. It turned out his clinical trials failed to show any positive effect of using Vitamin C to treat cancer. Since his trials were considered to be more rigorous, the scientific community trusted the Mayo Clinic’s data over the Cameron-Pauling trials.

While some “alternative” cancer doctors continued report success in using IVC to treat cancer patients, very few studies continued to look into why or how this was happening. It was not until 2004 that research completed at the National Institute of Health (NIH) lead to a discovery that Vitamin C taken intravenously (IV) generated over 100 times greater concentrations in the blood than taking Vitamin C orally.

The body has tight controls on how much Vitamin C concentrates in blood when taken orally, but administering the nutrient through IV bypasses those controls. Intaking high doses of Vitamin C through an IV is the only way to obtain the blood concentration levels required to achieve the anti-cancer effect.  This revelation explained why Moertel’s results were very different than Pauling’s. Armed with this information, many lab studies were launched to gain a deeper understanding of how IVC can help in the fight against cancer.

How Vitamin C helps kill cancer

In the last 20 years, over 100 studies were completed on how high doses of Vitamin C impacts cancer. This article breaks down the scientific evidence into an easy to understand guide.  The studies observed using IVC as a monotherapy (used by itself), and in combination with chemo and radiation therapy. Significant evidence shows IVC improves the ability of chemo and radiation to kill cancer cells, is able to prevent tumor growth when administered alone, and protects normal cells from the toxic effects of chemo and radiation therapy. An exciting aspect is these results have been observed when using IVC against a variety of cancer types. What makes Vitamin C effective against many cancers is that 13 different tumor disrupting mechanisms of action have been reported; this means IVC has multiple ways to attack cancer.  

The most commonly observed action that damages cancer cells is how Vitamin C imposes oxidative stress on the tumor. This occurs because high concentrations of Vitamin C in the blood (that can only be obtained when administering via an IV) generates high steady states of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) at the tumor site. H2O2 is very damaging to cancer cells, they are generally poor at fending it off while normal cells are not impacted.

Many of the studies researching Vitamin C detail the observed pharmacology, but the scientific explanations can be very complicated. This article includes a section that presents the IVC anti-cancer mechanism information in a straightforward manner.

Now that we have answers to the question of “How does high dose Vitamin C kill cancer?”, researchers in the know are imploring the oncological community to consider implementing this treatment into their approach. The National Cancer Institute published a hopeful call to action from Harvard and Johns Hopkins trained doctors, but far too few oncologists have picked up the research.

 The University of Iowa needs your support

Making the progress necessary to garner FDA approval for including IVC in the cancer fighting toolkit is an uphill battle. It requires a lot of money to move a Cancer treatment through the necessary three phases. Since Vitamin C cannot be patented, the typical investors (pharmaceutical companies) have no reason to push for approval. This means private donations and government grants will be needed to get it across the finish line.

Dr. Cullen has secured funding to complete several Phase II trials, but he needs more help to get through Phase III. Please forward this article to friends and family with a suggestion that they consider making a financial donation to the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center. 

Thank you Dr. Cullen and the Team at The University of Iowa!

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