B12 Injections during COVID-19 Pandemic

Switch to oral medication (Cyanocobalamin)

Coronavirus has made it necessary to move patients on B12 injections to oral treatment. 

Reason: RISK REDUCTION in terms of limiting your movement outside your home and contact with our staff and nurses.

Nationally all NHS organisations will be stopping injections during this difficult time.

We must ask you to respect this decision and not to telephone us requesting ‘exceptional circumstances’ as our Specialists inform us there are none.

Whilst we understand there is a lot of concern about the risk to health if your schedule of B12 injection is disrupted, our local hospital’s Consultant Haematologist and the British Society of Haematology have reassured us that this is not the case in the short to medium term.

Therefore postponement of B12 injections for at least 3 months during this period is a responsible measure to reduce patient exposure in the community and at the surgery.

In the meantime, the British Society of Haematology guidelines support switching B12 injections to daily oral cyanocobalamin (B12 tablets), which can be purchased over the counter from Pharmacies and Holland & Barrett and on the Internet from Amazon. There is no evidence that oral B12 is inferior or puts patients at risk. This will be the case for all patients, including those suffering from Pernicious Anaemia as well.

For patients with Pernicious Anaemia, those who have had bariatric or stomach surgery, have inflammatory bowel disease or Coeliac Disease, the dose of oral B12 (cyanocobalamin) advised is 1000micrograms every day

For all other patients, mainly due to dietary causes, it is safe to take oral B12 at a dose of 100 micrograms every day

You should start taking these supplements at the time your next injection is due - or earlier if you wish

We will continue to monitor the situation and inform you when the situation improves enough for you to safely receive your injections again