Vitamin C in Beta Thalassaemia

Your Questions answered.

Your Question:
"Why are we given vitamin C?" a patient with Beta Thalassaemia major.

My answer:
The iron accumulated in the body as a result of long term transfusions and increased absorption from the gut is “stored” in the body in many different forms. Not all these forms are available for Desferrioxamine (the active ingredient in Desferal injection) to combine with. The iron that is in the forms that can combine with Desferrioxamine is called “chelatable iron”.

What Vitamin C does is to mobilize the iron in the different storage forms to become “chelatable iron” thus enabling Desferrioxamine to combine with it and remove it from the body.

This action of vitamin C is very short lived and therefore it is important to time its use with the Desferal injection. It is recommended that the vitamin C tablet be chewed and swallowed at the time of inserting the needle for Desferal injection (pump).

Please note that use of too much vitamin C can be very harmful in patients with iron overloading.

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