IV Nutrition Therapy

St. Louis IV TherapyHave you heard about  IV nutrient therapy? It has been rapidly gaining popularity in St. Louis and throughout the world and can provide enormous health benefits!!  Intravenous nutrient therapy is a method of delivering vitamins, minerals, and other vital nutrients and/or therapeutic agents directly into the bloodstream.  It can be used to correct deficiencies, enhance immune function, increase energy, and/or as a preventative measure for anyone who is healthy and wants to stay healthy.  IV nutrients are given in therapeutic pharmacological doses greater than the minimal requirements of the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA), which are intended just to avoid deficiency states.  Because natural nutrients are easy on the body and welcomed, IV administration has an exceedingly high safety profile. IV nutrient therapy puts nutrients back into the body and improves the ability of the cells to detoxify, repair, and regenerate.

Some of the specific benefits that patients experience include:

  • increased energy
  • an overall sense of well-being
  • improved sports performance
  • enhanced immune support
  • improved healing and recovery from sports wear and tear, cosmetic procedures, and surgery
  • stress relief

IV therapy can improve or alleviate almost any health condition or complaint because we are simply giving the body what it needs to function properly–your body’s natural ability to heal itself does the rest.


Is it possible to overdose on the vitamins?

The short answer is No.  However, Vitamin B6 in excessive amounts can be problematic for some individuals.  As a precaution this particular vitamin is never given in excessive amounts in any vitamin infusion offered at The Institute.  The vitamins and other nutrients we use in our IVs are water-soluble and will be excreted by the body if they are not needed. When a patient requires vitamins or nutrients that are not water-soluble, more stringent testing is required and other forms of administration are used such as Intramuscular injections or oral administration.  Some nutrients cannot be administered intravenously. This is yet another reason to be sure you go to a facility where the practitioners are highly trained.

However, it is extremely rare for a patient to not need the vitamins and nutrients given in an infusion.  The vast majority of us are severely deficient in the vital nutrients our bodies need to function.

Can’t I just take oral vitamins?

IV therapy provides 100% absorption of the nutrients your body needs compared to only around 10% if taken by mouth.  IV administration also allows the body to receive much larger doses of vital nutrients that would not be tolerated by the gastrointestinal tract if taken orally.

How is this different from an IV push?

You may have seen advertisements from alternative medicine practitioners who offer intravenous vitamins through an IV “push.”  A proper IV Infusion is a large volume of nutrients mixed with a large volume of fluid (250 cc up to 1000 cc), whereas an IV push is essentially a 30-50 cc syringe of nutrients that are injected into the bloodstream.  This means that an IV infusion is 4 to 20 times larger than an IV push.