Vitamin fix: Moving the needle on intravenous drip therapy

Global Business

IVs are normally associated with surgery or sick patients being treated in hospitals, but there’s a new trend bringing IVs into posh clinics where people are voluntarily rolling up their sleeves. These IV infusions are filled with vitamins and sold to medically healthy people to boost their energy, mental clarity and rejuvenate skin tone.

CGTN’s May Lee has more from a city leading the way – Los Angeles.

Celebrities and A-listers swear by it for everything from curing a handover to severe fatigue. It’s called the IV vitamin infusion. But what was once a treatment only for the select few is now available to the masses and it’s catching becoming incredibly popular in Los Angeles. John Hines has been coming to Drip Doctors one of the first IV Vitamin Therapy Clinics in LA, for two years. He said he has much more energy and better mental clarity since starting the treatments.

Dr. Anthony Ho, co-founder of Drip Doctors, is also an emergency room physician who embraced the concept after seeing the results of treating patients daily with IV vitamins. And unlike oral vitamins with an absorption rate of about 30 percent, with IVs, 100 percent of the vitamins are absorbed.

But critics said there’s no reason to go beyond what’s recommended by the Food and Nutrition Board of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.

“We’re talking about giving vitamins beyond the RDA. What does that stand for… The Recommended Daily Allowance,” Dr. Raj Dasgupta of the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine said. “They take into consideration about the absorption issues. They take into consideration gender, race, age, weight so this isn’t an arbitrary number. This is validated when we make these recommendations.”

Dr. Dasgupta adds, there are also dangers associated with IV therapy, including possible bruising, clotting, bleeding and risk of infection.