NAD+ IV Therapy: What It Is, Benefits and What to Expect

Key Takeaways

• NAD+ is a coenzyme every cell uses to turn food into usable energy, and it supports enzymes that maintain DNA.
• An IV drip delivers NAD+ through a vein at an infusion clinic, where the clinician sets the rate and session length.
• Liv also offers NAD+ as an injection, a nasal spray and oral drops.
• A licensed provider reviews your health history and helps you choose the format that fits your life.

Maybe you've seen NAD+ drips on a wellness menu and wondered what's actually in the bag. The bag holds NAD+, a coenzyme your cells already use every day, and a drip is only one way to take it.

What Is NAD+ IV Therapy?

It's NAD+ (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide) given into a vein through an IV.

What Does NAD+ Do in Your Cells?

It helps more than 400 enzymes do their work, and no other helper molecule made from a vitamin works with as many. Your body makes it from niacin (vitamin B3), and NAD+ is the main active form niacin is turned into. It also makes some from tryptophan, an amino acid in protein. Here are three of the jobs NAD+ helps your cells do:

• Feel more in the tank: Every cell you have converts food into usable energy, and that conversion runs on NAD+.
• Built to bounce back: Your DNA takes small hits every day. The enzymes that repair it spend NAD+ to do the work.
• Firing on all cylinders: Cells coordinate through enzymes that manage stress and signaling. Those enzymes depend on NAD+.

Sirtuins need NAD+ to work too. They're a family of enzymes that help control which genes are switched on. Two other enzyme families, CD38 and PARPs, rely on it as well.

Levels also change as you get older. In a small study of healthy adults aged 20 to 87, plasma NAD+ was significantly lower in people in their early 50s than in people in their 20s, and levels were lower with age across that whole range. Lower levels with age have also been measured in human skin from newborn to age 77.

Researchers reviewing these findings point to possible reasons: cells using more NAD+, making less of it, or tissues changing in makeup with age.

These are age comparisons in healthy adults, not results from any NAD+ treatment.

Your levels also move within a day. A research review describes NAD+ rising and falling with food intake, exercise and the time of day.

Start with an evaluation

Why Do People Choose an Infusion?

Usually for practical reasons: a gut that doesn't reliably absorb what you swallow, or not wanting another daily pill.

Other Ways to Take NAD+

Liv doesn't offer NAD+ infusions. Liv offers NAD+ you take at home instead, as an injection, a nasal spray or oral drops. Each one contains NAD+, the same active ingredient, and your provider helps you choose the one that suits your body and your routine.

What Is a Session Like?

You'd go to an infusion clinic, where the clinician running your session sets the rate and how long it lasts. Liv's NAD+ formats are different: you use them at home, on the schedule your provider sets.

What Researchers Measured During an Infusion

Researchers have followed what happens to NAD+ during an infusion, and early on the body clears it from the blood quickly. In a small pilot study, they tracked NAD+ and the substances it breaks down into during and after a 6-hour IV infusion. They measured both in blood plasma and in urine.

For the first 2 hours, plasma levels of NAD+ and those breakdown products didn't change. The researchers described the infused NAD+ as rapidly and completely removed from the plasma over that time.

By the 6-hour mark, more NAD+ and methylnicotinamide, one of its breakdown products, showed up in urine. Nicotinamide, another breakdown product, didn't rise significantly in urine.

The researchers said the mix of breakdown products was consistent with the activity of two enzymes that break NAD+ apart.

Side Effects and Safety Notes

With Liv's formats, tell your provider about any side effects before changing your dose. Liv's protocol lets your provider keep the same strength and prescribe it less often.

Before you start NAD+ with Liv, your provider will ask about:

• Your medicines and supplements: include everything you take in your health form.
• Nicotinamide riboside: if you already take it, your provider may decide not to prescribe NAD+ alongside it.

How Liv Can Help

You fill out a short health form online, and a licensed provider reviews it within 48 hours and decides whether NAD+ is right for you. If it does, a state-licensed compounding pharmacy prepares your prescription. Shipping is free, and delivery usually takes 3 to 5 days after approval, though compounding can add time.

Your provider reviews your plan before every refill at no extra cost, and you can change formats later if you'd prefer another one. There's no membership fee, and you can skip a shipment or cancel from your account.

Ready to see whether NAD+ fits your plan? Start with a short online health form.

Related reading: The wider NAD+ supplement guide

Frequently Asked Questions