An Experiment on Human Vitamin B ₆ Deprivation

Treatment of severe neutropenia with high-dose pyridoxine in a patient with chronic graft versus host disease and squamous cell carcinoma: a case report

“…The differential diagnosis for neutropenia in our patient includes drug effects, infection, the immune-suppressive effects of chronic GvHD, autoimmunity [5], and a deficiency of micronutrients [2-4]. Her neutropenia failed to respond to discontinuation of drugs that have been associated with neutropenia, was not associated with recent CMV viremia or antineutrophil antibodies, and was not associated with sepsis or a flare of her chronic GvHD.…”

“…An association of Vitamin B6 deficiency with severe neutropenia is a rare finding [2-4]. We describe the case of a patient who had severe neutropenia (neutrophil count of 48 cells/uL) associated with profound Vitamin B6 deficiency that markedly improved with high dose Vitamin B6 therapy.…”

Micronutrients and women of reproductive potential: required dietary intake and consequences of dietary deficiency or excess. Part I – Folate, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B6

“…Vitamin B 6 deficiency can lead to a seborrheic dermatitis [169], microcytic anaemia [170], epileptiform convulsions [171], depression and confusion [172]. The anaemia is due to impaired haeme synthesis.…”

Experimentally Induced Vitamin Deficiencies in Man

“…Other observers have not as yet recorded a similar experiment. Pyridoxin Hawkins and Barsky (1948) attempted to induce a pyridoxin deficiency in one of them (Hawkins) by taking a purified diet with addition of all the necessary known vitamins except pyridoxin for 54 days, after which he received a supplement of 10 mg. of pyridoxin daily for seven days. Findings during the period of deprivation were indefinite, but lack of the vitamin may have been related to the development of albuminuria (though Hawkins had an old history of renal colic), to some depression and mental confusion which disappeared on adding pyridoxin to the diet, and to a lymphocytosis which also disappeared with resumption of a normal diet.…”

“…It is, moreover, probable that as more" becomes known about anti-vitamins it may be possible to provoke a vitamin deficiency in a subject on a full diet by giving the appropriate anti-vitamin. This has been suggested by Hawkins and Barsky (1948) in the case of pyridoxin, to which the appropriate anti-vitamin is desoxypyridine. Studies on experimentally induced vitamin deficiency fall into two groups-those in which the investigator has gone as far as he dare in an attempt to produce more and more symptoms and signs, and those in which the emphasis has been on dietary restriction rather than deprivation and the main object has been to discover the amount of restriction necessary to cause minimal signs and symptoms.…”