Folic acid helps your body produce and maintain new cells, and also helps prevent changes to DNA that may lead to cancer. As a medication, folic acid is used to treat folic acid deficiency and certain types of anemia (lack of red blood cells) caused by folic acid deficiency.
Folic acid ( Vitamin B9 or Vitamin M ) – USMLE Biochemistry
Folate – Folate is also called vitamin B9. The terms “folate” and “folic acid” are sometimes used interchangeably; however, the vitamin is found in nature as a folate, while folic acid is the synthetic form used therapeutically and is an oxidized, water-soluble form that does not exist in nature . Dietary folates are also called folate polyglutamates .
Folinic acid (leucovorin, N5-formyl-tetrahydofolate [THF], 5-formylTHF) and 5-methyltetrahydrofolate (5-MTHF) are naturally occurring forms of reduced folate .
Folinic acid is typically used to prevent toxicities of methotrexate and to potentiate cytotoxicity of fluorouracil (FU) in chemotherapy regimens for colon cancer. This is because folinic acid is rapidly converted to the metabolically active form of folate required in cells (tetrahydrofolate) without the need for dihydrofolate reductase, which is inhibited by methotrexate. 5-MTHF is the most abundant form of folate in plasma. Folic acid, folinic acid, and 5-MTHF are all effective in treating folate deficiency.
