Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C)
ASCOR is an intravenous form of vitamin C used short-term to treat scurvy when patients cannot take it by mouth.
🧬 Where this information comes from Click to expand
The clinical label records used on this page are FDA-filed Structured Product Labeling (SPL) retrieved through openFDA. We identified 1 clinical label set within the page’s selected clinical scope after exact ingredient or ingredient-combination matching and applicable route/form matching. Forms, routes, brands, labelers, strengths, and NDC product-record counts are built separately from matching FDA National Drug Code Directory records. The linked DailyMed document is a representative official source for verification, not the page’s only clinical source. View the linked label on DailyMed →
📖 Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C): Patient Information Guide
A plain-language walkthrough of Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) — what it treats, how it works, how it’s taken, side effects, warnings and interactions. Tap any section to expand it.
🎯What it's used for▾
ASCOR treats scurvy in patients who cannot take vitamin C by mouth. It is approved for:
- Adults with scurvy who cannot take oral vitamin C
- Children 5 months and older with scurvy who cannot take oral vitamin C
It is not intended for low vitamin C levels that have not yet caused scurvy symptoms.
⚙️How it works▾
The exact mechanism isn't fully understood, but IV ascorbic acid is believed to work by directly replenishing the body's depleted vitamin C pool. Scurvy develops when vitamin C levels fall so low that the body can no longer support normal tissue repair and other essential functions. Delivering vitamin C through the bloodstream bypasses the gut and quickly restores those stores.
💊How it's taken▾
ASCOR is given as a slow intravenous (IV) infusion once daily — the exact dose depends on the patient's age. Treatment lasts no longer than one week. It must be prepared and diluted by a pharmacist before use and administered slowly by a healthcare provider; infusing it too rapidly can cause side effects like flushing and dizziness.
- Special populations (pregnant women, breastfeeding women, patients with G6PD deficiency) should not receive more than the U.S. Recommended Dietary Allowance for vitamin C
- Always follow your care team's instructions — do not self-administer
🤒Side effects — in detail▾
The most common side effects are pain and swelling where the IV is placed. If the infusion is given too quickly, you may also experience:
- Faintness or dizziness
- Nausea
- Flushing
- Headache
- Lethargy
More serious reactions — including kidney damage (oxalate nephropathy) and severe red blood cell breakdown (hemolysis in G6PD-deficient patients) — are rare but require immediate medical attention if suspected.
⚠️Warnings & precautions▾
- Kidney damage (oxalate nephropathy): High doses or prolonged use can cause oxalate crystals to build up in the kidneys. Patients with kidney disease, a history of kidney stones, older adults, and children under 2 are at highest risk. Kidney function should be monitored in these patients.
- Hemolysis in G6PD deficiency: Patients with this genetic red blood cell condition can develop serious, rapid red blood cell breakdown. A lower dose is used and blood counts are monitored. Treatment is stopped immediately if hemolysis is suspected.
- Lab test interference: Ascorbic acid can interfere with blood and urine glucose tests — let your care team know you are receiving this medication before any lab work.
🔀What it interacts with▾
ASCOR can interact with several medications. Let your care team know everything you are taking:
- Certain antibiotics (erythromycin, kanamycin, streptomycin, doxycycline, lincomycin) — ascorbic acid may reduce their effectiveness; ASCOR may need to be stopped
- Bleomycin (used in cancer treatment) — ascorbic acid may inactivate it
- Amphetamines — ascorbic acid makes urine more acidic, which can lower amphetamine levels in the blood
- Fluphenazine and other pH-sensitive drugs — urine acidification can change how these drugs are absorbed and cleared
- Warfarin — standard anticoagulation monitoring should continue as usual
This is not a complete list of interactions. Always talk with your doctor or pharmacist before starting, stopping, or changing any medication.
📋Before taking it▾
- Kidney disease or impairment: Higher risk for kidney complications; kidney function will be monitored
- History of kidney stones (especially oxalate stones): Increased risk of stone formation
- G6PD deficiency: Risk of serious hemolysis; requires a lower dose and blood count monitoring
- Pregnancy: Dosing should stay within the U.S. RDA for pregnant women
- Breastfeeding: Dosing should stay within the U.S. RDA for breastfeeding women; vitamin C does pass into breast milk
- Children under 2 years: Immature kidneys increase the risk of oxalate kidney damage; close monitoring needed
- Older adults: May be at increased risk for kidney complications
🚑If you take too much▾
Too much ascorbic acid can cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, facial flushing, rash, headache, fatigue, or disrupted sleep. If an overdose occurs, the infusion should be stopped immediately, symptoms treated, and any additional vitamin C intake avoided until resolved.
🔬Pharmacokinetics — how your body processes it▾
After an IV infusion, ascorbic acid spreads widely through the body — with high concentrations found in the liver, white blood cells, platelets, glandular tissues, and the lens of the eye. It also crosses the placenta and is distributed into breast milk. The body has a natural threshold: once tissues are saturated with vitamin C, any extra is filtered out and excreted in the urine. When stores are low, very little is lost in urine because the body holds onto it. Ascorbic acid is partly converted to oxalate during metabolism, which is why high doses raise the risk of kidney stones. The half-life — the time it takes for blood levels to fall by half — is about 7.4 hours.
📦How to store it▾
Store in a refrigerator at 2° to 8°C (36° to 46°F). Protect from light. or shipping are acceptable.
📄 Written from Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C)’s FDA-approved label information, summarized in plain language with AI, and reviewed by our pharmacy team before publication. Every point is grounded in that labeling — nothing is invented. How we use AI →
🩺 Pharmacist Counseling Corner
Quick, plain-English answers to the questions patients ask most about Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) — the kind of thing our pharmacy team would talk through with you at the counter.
Why am I getting vitamin C through an IV — isn't it just a supplement? ▾
How long will I need to receive these IV infusions? ▾
What should I watch out for during treatment? ▾
I have G6PD deficiency — is this safe for me? ▾
Will this affect any of my other medications or my lab tests? ▾
I'm pregnant — is this safe? ▾
Is Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) available over the counter? ▾
💬 Answers drafted from Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C)’s FDA-approved label information, summarized in plain language with AI, and reviewed by our pharmacy team before publication. Grounded in that labeling — nothing is made up. How we use AI →
🧰 Keep exploring
📈 What people report — real-world data (FDA FAERS)
After a medicine reaches the market, patients, doctors and drugmakers can send the FDA reports of problems they think may be linked to it. Here’s what’s been reported for Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) — a signal of what to watch for, not proof the drug caused it.
Source: openFDA, from the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS). These are voluntary reports — they don’t prove the drug caused the effect, and counts reflect how often something was reported, not how often it actually happens. Reports also often name the very problem the medicine is taken for — a common reason to file one is that the drug didn’t help — so for a pain reliever you may see “pain” high on the list; that points to why the report was filed, not to the drug causing the symptom. This counts every report that lists Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) in any role, so the total runs higher than the FDA’s official dashboard, which counts only cases where the drug is the suspect. For the authoritative figures, see the FDA FAERS Public Dashboard. Always talk to your pharmacist or doctor.
🏛️ The road to your pharmacy
How Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) went from FDA review to the pharmacy shelf — the key milestones in its regulatory journey.
Source: Drugs@FDA.
🚨 Recall history
A recall is when a specific batch of a medicine is pulled from the market — usually a manufacturing issue, not a problem with the drug itself. Class I is most serious, Class III least.
Source: openFDA drug enforcement (recall) reports.
RxNorm Concept Web — From Ingredient to Every Form and Strength
This page starts with one ingredient concept (IN). The branches below show its dose-form concepts (SCDF), then the available clinical drug and strength concepts (SCD). Combination products remain separate concepts with their own pages.
RxCUI 1151 15 dose forms · 42 strengths
-
Dose form (SCDF) Chewable Tablet RxCUI 370599No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 60 MGRxCUI 308399100 MGRxCUI 313841120 MGRxCUI 1441371125 MGRxCUI 245473200 MGRxCUI 141991250 MGRxCUI 308384500 MGRxCUI 3138031000 MGRxCUI 333831 -
Dose form (SCDF) Disintegrating Oral Tablet RxCUI 602126No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 100 MGRxCUI 602127250 MGRxCUI 602135 -
Dose form (SCDF) Extended Release Oral Capsule RxCUI 370598No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 500 MGRxCUI 308391 -
Dose form (SCDF) Extended Release Oral Tablet RxCUI 370600No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 500 MGRxCUI 3083921000 MGRxCUI 3083821500 MGRxCUI 237718 -
Dose form (SCDF) Injectable Solution RxCUI 370597No current FDA listing -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Capsule RxCUI 370594No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 125 MGRxCUI 2699355500 MGRxCUI 198896750 MGRxCUI 26034821000 MGRxCUI 245462 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Lozenge RxCUI 370604No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 25 MGRxCUI 24547453 MGRxCUI 142490260 MGRxCUI 237717 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Powder RxCUI 846044No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 500 MGRxCUI 21217051060 MGRxCUI 846045 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Solution RxCUI 370934No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 60 MG/MLRxCUI 243789100 MG/MLRxCUI 308377 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Suspension RxCUI 2707115No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 100 MG/MLRxCUI 2707116 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Tablet RxCUI 370601No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 50 MGRxCUI 308396100 MGRxCUI 198893200 MGRxCUI 283294250 MGRxCUI 199083500 MGRxCUI 2824021000 MGRxCUI 1988971500 MGRxCUI 198892 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Wafer RxCUI 370602No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 500 MGRxCUI 237722 -
Dose form (SCDF) Powder for Oral Solution RxCUI 2636651No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 2000 MGRxCUI 26366522100 MGRxCUI 2636654 -
Dose form (SCDF) Powder for Oral Suspension RxCUI 2284147No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 1000 MGRxCUI 2832934000 MGRxCUI 282737 -
Dose form (SCDF) Topical Cream RxCUI 377583No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 100 MG/MLRxCUI 199834
Look up RxCUI 1151 in the RxCUI Atlas →
RxNorm is the U.S. National Library of Medicine’s normalized drug vocabulary. Its concept hierarchy can include forms that are not currently marketed; the status on each branch compares that concept with current FDA listings. RxCUIs identify vocabulary concepts, not individual packages or manufacturers.
📦 Supply & shortage status
Whether Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) is in short supply in the U.S. right now, plus any shortage history the FDA has on record. A shortage usually reflects a manufacturing or demand issue — not a safety problem with the drug.
Source: openFDA, from the FDA Drug Shortages database.
🏷️ Sold under these brand names
RxNorm drug class
Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C) belongs to the Vitamin C class.
Classified by RxNorm RxClass — the U.S. National Library of Medicine's standardized drug-classification service (Established Pharmacologic Class from the FDA, the ATC drug family from the WHO, and mechanism of action). Reference only, not medical advice.
🔬 Where this comes from
Core label, product, RxNorm, safety, and utilization data on this page come from the sources identified below. AI-written, editorial, and licensed sections are labeled separately.
How we combine label and product data
HelloPharmacist combines public FDA and NLM records; we don’t author the underlying clinical facts. We identified 1 FDA-filed SPL label set within the page’s selected clinical scope after exact ingredient or ingredient-combination matching and applicable route/form matching. The representative label is the starting point for the displayed reference monograph; the 12 largest stored in-scope SPL records, which may include that representative, are compared section by section, and the longest available version of each section is retained. Forms, routes, brands, labelers, product-listed strengths, and product-record counts are aggregated separately from ingredient-matched FDA NDC Directory records; package records listed above are associated with the linked SPL; and the normalized concept hierarchy comes from NLM RxNorm.
For canonical ingredient pages, bounded product-attributed indication and administration excerpts may be added to the AI evidence, and the generator is instructed to preserve available product, brand, route, and form qualifiers instead of treating one label as universal. Where a section is identified as AI-written, its plain-language text is generated from bounded label evidence. New draft drug pages remain in the admin review queue before first publication. McGuff Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is the representative DailyMed label linked for verification and dates; it is not the sole source used for the page.
This is general education, not medical advice — always consult your doctor or pharmacist about your medications and any medical condition. For the exact wording of the linked representative label, view that label on DailyMed; some displayed composite sections may come from other in-scope SPL labels. Learn how we use AI and our data sources & update cadence.