If you’ve heard of IV Therapy, you’ve also likely noticed there are health claims for IV therapy for just about every condition under the sun. Fertility? Menopause? Low Energy? IVs have ‘got you covered’.

At The Clara Clinic, our goal is to deliver the highest quality integrative health care, and that means laying out the facts so you can make an informed decision when it comes to your health. This also means helping you avoid getting wrapped up in fad or trendy medical treatments.

With that said, today, we’re answering the question, can IVs really help support your mental health and well-being?

How IV Therapy Works

Before we dive into that question, let’s quickly review how IV therapy works.

IV therapy is an efficient way to care for your health, by injecting safe doses of vitamins, amino acids, nutrients, and minerals directly into your bloodstream.

With IV therapy, you don’t have to wait for nutrients to pass through the liver and digestive tract. Instead, nutrients are delivered directly to the blood stream. This means fast, 100% absorption of vitamins and minerals, instead of 10-20% of absorption we see with oral supplementation.

IV therapy itself hasn’t been studied specifically for most health conditions. Rather, the nutrients vitamins, and minerals being injected have been studied extensively. And while you can just as easily supplement orally, IV therapy is just a more efficient way of getting these key ingredients delivered. This can come in handy when you’re someone who doesn’t want to take supplements daily, are struggling to keep to your routines, or alternatively, are dealing with something extremely chronic that is impacting your quality of life.

How IV Therapy Actually Supports Mental Health & Well-Being

With all that said, how can IV therapy, and the nutrients IV therapy delivers, help support your mental health & well-being?

Delivers nutrients to help support a healthier stress response & reduced oxidative stress

One of the biggest draws to IV therapy for mental health support, is delivering nutrients that help reduce oxidative stress and help support a healthier stress response.

We know from research that oxidative stress has been implicated in depression, anxiety disorders and high anxiety levels. We also know that stressful life events, and chronic stress, has been associated with depression and anxiety as well.

In a 2012 study, supplementation with high antioxidant vitamins for 6 weeks was found to significantly reduce anxiety and depression scores in patients.

The main antioxidants in the brain are vitamin E, vitamin C, and glutathione. While we can easily get vitamin E and C in our diets, glutathione is more difficult to control. Luckily, our IV formulas contain glutathione, to help deliver the highest quality antioxidants, thereby supporting your mental health and well-being.

We also include a combination of B vitamins, magnesium, calcium, selenium, and zinc, to provide the essential nutrients required for a healthy stress response.

Delivers nutrients to help combat inflammation

More and more research has highlighted a strong link between inflammation and mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety, and OCD. For example, a new brain imaging study by CAMH showed for the first time that brain inflammation is more than 30 per cent higher in people with OCD than in people without the condition.

Although research is very preliminary, studies looking at anti-inflammatory and antioxidant treatments have shown promise in the treatment of depression and anxiety.

IVs, and in particular, Vitamin C and zinc, can help to support a healthier immune and inflammatory response, thereby helping to control inflammation in the body.

Delivers key nutrients for neurotransmitter health & synthesis

Neurotransmitters are your body’s chemical messengers and are highly implicated in brain function, mental health and well-being. Many of our medication options for mental health disorders such as depression and anxiety actually work by modulating these neurotransmitters so we can feel better emotionally.

What many don’t know about neurotransmitters is that they require cofactors to be created. Several B vitamins including thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6, folate, and vitamin B12, are needed as cofactors for the synthesis and creation of neurotransmitters. Even vitamin C and zinc are important for the proper functioning of our neurotransmitters such as GABA, which helps us feel calm and relaxed.

When we look at the most common nutritional deficiencies seen in patients with mental health conditions, B vitamins, minerals, and amino acids that are precursors to neurotransmitters have been implicated.

IV Therapy can deliver these nutrients quickly, and straight into the bloodstream, to help support healthy synthesis of neurotransmitters, and therefore help to support your mental health and well-being.

Helps support nutrient status

Last, but certainly not least, there have been numerous studies evaluating the link between nutrient deficiencies, low nutrient status, and mental health. Research has found that:

Supplementation of nine vitamins, 10 times in excess of normal recommended dietary allowance (RDA) for 1-year improved mood in both men and women. This mood improvement was particularly associated with improved vitamin B2 and B6 status.
It has been observed that patients with depression have blood folate levels that are 25% lower on average than healthy controls. Low levels of folate have also been identified as a strong predisposing factor of poor outcome with antidepressant therapy.
Low selenium intake has been associated with lowered mood status. Intervention studies with selenium revealed that selenium improves mood and diminishes anxiety.
In at least five studies, zinc levels have been found to be lower in those with clinical depression. It has also been found that supplementing with zinc can influence the effectiveness of antidepressant therapy.

Therefore, infusing these vitamins and minerals via IV therapy may help support depressive symptoms and overall mental health and well-being.

How IV Therapy Works at Our Clinic

If you’re struggling with your mental well-being and interested in IVs, it’s really important you undergo the proper screening measures to make sure you’re actually a good candidate for IV therapy. At our clinic, we try to make this screening process as easy as possible for you! Here’s how our process works:

Step 1: Complimentary Screening Appointment + Blood Work

We have you complete a complimentary 15-minute IV consult. That way, before you even get started, we are certain your health goals are aligned with what IV therapy can provide. If we think you’d be better suited with different types of treatment, we’ll let you know in this very first call! We’ll also quickly go through some medical background and screening questions to make sure IV therapy is safe for you. If at the end of the call, you’ve decided you’d like to move forward with IVs, we’ll have our administrative team set you up with a blood work requisition to once again confirm you are physically fit and safe to receive IV therapy.

Step 2: Initial IV Therapy Appointment

At the end of your 15-minute call we’ll book you in for your very first IV therapy appointment. When you arrive, we’ll quickly chat through your lab results with you, and complete some physical exams. We’ll also review your goals one more time to ensure nothing has changed, and to confirm we are providing you with the best formula possible for you!

Step 3: IV Treatment Series

After your initial visit, we’ll set you up for a series of IV appointments based on your goals and needs. Typically, we recommend people come in once weekly (or bi-weekly) for a series of 4-6 sessions for optimal results. That said, your IV Naturopathic Doctor will help you decide on a treatment frequency that makes the most sense for you.

Looking for more support?

If you’re struggling with your mental health and well-being, and want to find ways of supporting yourself physically and mentally, you can check out our pages on IV Therapy, Naturopathic mental health support, and Psychotherapy. If you’d like to speak to someone about how IV therapy can support you, you can book a complimentary consult with one of our IV Naturopathic Doctors here.