Vitamin C or ascorbic acid (AA) was discovered by Albert von Szent-Györgyi for which he received the 1937 Nobel Prize in Medicine. Linus Poling, one of only 4 people to win the Nobel prize twice, devoted many years of his life to researching AA. A wealth of information on AA is available on Oregon State University’s Linus Pauling Institute website.

Many studies have shown that AA is important in collagen formation. It is also important for the proliferation of stem cells. A study of 1210 hospitalized patients showed that intravenous infusion of AA in doses of 3–10 grams/day reduced the mortality of critically ill patients. AA also plays a vital role in the functioning of the immune system as well as inflammation.

This post was prompted not only by thoughts of how to boost your immunity and increase your resistance to viral infections but also by a recent paper with a catchy title, Dietary ascorbic acid restriction in GNL/SMP30-knockout mice unveils the role of ascorbic acid in regulation of somatic and visceral pain sensitivity. The authors conclude “our data unveil the critical role of ascorbic acid in regulating somatic and visceral pain sensitivity and support accumulating clinical evidence for the usefulness of ascorbic acid in pain management.”

Another example of a basic science study of the role of AA in pain modulation is Evidence for the involvement of glutamatergic system in the antinociceptive effect of ascorbic acid.

And what about migraines? Surprisingly, nobody has done any studies of AA for the treatment of migraines. There is only one case report published in The New England Journal of Medicine describing a 32-year-old man who controlled his migraine headaches with a daily dose of 6 grams of ascorbic acid for six years. He participated in a double-blind study in which he was given either AA or placebo. At the end of 15 days, he correctly identified all days he had received vitamin C and all days he had received a placebo.

How much should you take? The Linus Pauling Institute suggests 400 mg a day, although many popular vitamin C supplements contain 1,000 mg. Taking 1,000 mg is safe, although any amount of AA can cause heartburn or upset stomach because vitamin C is an acid.

Vitamin D level testing is no longer covered by many insurers and many doctors, NY Times, and other media consider taking vitamin D supplements of unproven benefit. I’ve written 10 blog posts over the past 12 years on vitamin D. These posts describe highly scientific studies of the role of vitamin D deficiency on the development of delirium in hospitalized patients, multiple sclerosis, major diseases and dying, and of course migraines.

This morning, Dr. Leo Galland during his TV appearance mentioned the importance of supplements that can boost the immune system and reduce our susceptibility to viral diseases. He mentioned vitamin D and curcumin. Dr. Galland is a highly respected physician who often helps patients with problems that are difficult to diagnose and treat. I’ve reviewed one of his excellent books The Allergy Solution in a previous post.

What prompted another post on vitamin D besides Dr. Galland’s TV appearance, was a 593-patient Mayo Clinic study which reported increased severity of fibromyalgia in patients with vitamin D deficiency. Of these 593 patients, 122 or 21% had vitamin D deficiency. Patients with lower vitamin D levels also reported higher rates of anxiety and depression and were more likely to be overweight.

If you do get your vitamin D level tested, check what the actual result is. The normal range in most laboratories is from 30 to 100. However, if you are at the bottom of the normal range, you may be deficient and be more predisposed to a variety of medical conditions. Keep your level at least in the middle of the range.

Light sensitivity is a common feature of migraine headaches and during an attack most people prefer being in the dark. According to a Harvard professor, Dr. Rami Burstein, exposure to pure green light may be better than being in complete darkness.

Dr. Burstein is one of the world’s most productive and creative headache researchers. His research has been published in such leading medical journals as Brain, Nature, Pain, Neurology, Journal of Neuroscience, and many other. This is to say that his research is of high quality and can be trusted.

I’ve known Rami for over 20 years and he never ceases to surprise with a fresh look at old phenomena that have lead him to many breakthrough discoveries. While studying light sensitivity, he decided to look at the effect of different parts of the visible light spectrum on the brain of experimental animals as well as migraine sufferers.  According to his research published in Brain, white light as well as other colors of the spectrum worsen pain perception, but green light reduces pain. Blue light produces the strongest pain response and this is why some of my patients find relief from wearing orange-colored lenses that block the blue part of the spectrum.

Another paper by Burstein and his colleagues published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that exposure green light also has a positive effect on mood and autonomic nervous system functions.

Because of these findings Dr. Burstein developed a lamp that produces pure green color. A regular green-tinted bulb will not work because it does not emit a pure green light. Admixture of other colors negates the beneficial effect of the purely green light. He told me that the original prototype of the lamp cost $50,000, but eventually he and his business partners were able to reduce the price to a couple of hundred dollars. Now, you may think that he is out to make some money on his research, but that is not the case. Being a full professor at Harvard means that the university keeps the profits.

The lamp became available only a month ago and you can buy it at AllayLamp.com.  Keep in mind that for green light to work, you have to turn off all other lights and computer screens and close the shades. It may take 1-2 hours to make your pain, throbbing, and other symptoms to subside. A patient I recently saw loved the idea of this lamp because whenever she gets a migraine in the summer she finds relief by sitting in her dense green garden.

Vitamin B12 (cyanocobalamin) deficiency has been long suspected to play a role in the development of migraines, but so far it has not been directly linked to migraines.

A new study published in the latest issue of Headache compared vitamin B12 status in 70 migraine sufferers with 70 healthy people with similar demographics. Serum levels of vitamin B12 were found to be significantly lower in migraine patients than in healthy subjects. Vitamin B12 levels are notoriously inaccurate, so the authors confirmed this finding by testing for a more sensitive indicator of deficiency, methylmalonic acid (MMA), which goes up as the vitamin B12 levels go down. Patients with the B12 levels in the highest quartile had 80% lower chance of having migraines compared to those with levels in the bottom quartile. Patients in the highest quartile of MMA had more than 5 times increased risk of having migraines.

In a study migraine sufferers with elevated homocysteine levels, which is another indicator of deficiency of vitamin B12 and other B vitamins, were given vitamins B12, folic acid and vitamin B6. Their homocysteine levels dropped and migraine-related disability improved. Elevated homocysteine level is suspected to be responsible for the increased risk of strokes in patients with migraines with aura, although that is still unproven.

This latest study only shows correlation, but it does not prove that taking vitamin B12 and increasing your serum level will relieve migraines. Nevertheless, it makes sense to have your level at least in the middle of normal range since vitamin B12 is important for many brain functions. For example, multiple sclerosis patients with low B12 levels have higher disability and vitamin B12 deficiency may predispose to Alzheimer’s disease.

I’ve written in the past that long-term intake of heartburn drugs often leads to vitamin B12 deficiency. You may want to read an article in the Wall Street Journal published earlier this year, Vitamin B-12 Deficiency: The Serious Health Problem That’s Easy To Miss.