Ascorbic Acid in Chronic Psychiatric Patients —A Controlled Trial

Anxiety and excitement have been shown by Maas (1961) to increase the rate of breakdown of ascorbic acid, and in schizophrenics this process may be exaggerated by an abnormality of adrenaline metabolism (Briggs, 1962). Schizophrenics receiving “adequate” dietary amounts of vitamin C, as judged by the requirements of the normal population, are commonly found to have low blood ascorbate levels. Evidence of low blood ascorbate levels in most psychiatric patients has been gathered by Horwitt (1942), Leitner and Church (1956) and others. It has been debated whether such laboratory findings are associated with a state of “subscurvy”, where the individual has the complaints of excessive tiredness, depression, irritability and vague ill-health. Many authorities claim that there is no clinical evidence to justify the distinction of a state of “hypovitaminosis C”. They claim that one either absorbs sufficient ascorbic acid to maintain health, or so little that the classical condition of scurvy supervenes.