Oncology-Cancer

Formatted Version

Dear Patient,

As promised, I will be sending the Integrative Oncology Support Updates as I process the research.

Some will be more formal, with long rambling commentary, and some will be quick informal notes of the study and my thinking. This informality is what will allow me to keep this dialogue relevant and updated as I process the huge amount of information that comes in.

Dr B

Intravenous Vitamin C

Formatted Version

"The perfect is the enemy of the good" Voltaire

Dear Patient,

Welcome to the first Integrative Oncology Support Update.

COMMENT: A very important study on how much effect proper diet can have on controlling cancer. By reducing the carbohydrates and increasing the protein in their diet, they showed that "carcinomas grew slower in mice on diets containing low amylose CHO and high protein compared with a Western diet characterized by relatively high CHO and low protein.

COMMENT: The conclusion says it all: Dietary flaxseed has the potential to reduce tumor growth in patients with breast cancer.' We usually recommend it in the form of a high-lignan flax seed oil that we carry, rather then the muffin. It is important to shake the oil VERY well, otherwise the lignans will sink to the bottom and you won't get the full benefit.

COMMENT:
After many years of concerns being raised, this is a fairly strong beginning statement from a conservative international body. It does not say that cell phones cause brain cancer, but that "the evidence, while still accumulating, is strong enough to support a conclusion ...The conclusion means that there could be some risk, and therefore we need to keep a close watch for a link between cell phones and cancer risk."

COMMENTS:
This study of a new drug treatment does show improved survival (about 20%) in melanoma patients at 6 months. However, by 9 months, there was no difference between the groups, and 85-90% of patients were progressing in their disease. So we see a slight improvement at 6 months that fades.
For stage III or IV (cancer has already spread to other parts of the body) melanoma patients, this new drug may give them a few more months of controlled disease.

UPDATE 2/26/12- For some reason the website screening.dk is down. The informed consent booklet can still be found at the cochrane collaboration website: http://www.cochrane.dk/screening/mammography-leaflet.pdf

Screening for breast cancer with mammography is a very contentious subject. There are risks and benefits to both screening and not screening, therefore each person needs to really educate themselves and make a very personal decision.

COMMENTS:
It is not that often that a study this important comes along, with the potential to radically alter the way most oncologist practice. Standard practice has been to take out all of the lymph nodes in the axilla (armpit) of the side of the cancer. This practice has a high risk of shoulder pain, lympedema (swelling), as well as infections.
What this study shows is that woman who get the far less invasive Sentinel Node dissection, do just as well long-term as those who get the Axillary Node dissection.

COMMENTS:
The abstract is long, but the take home message is clear: Additive therapy with OE (oral enzymes) given for more than 6 months decreased the hazard of death for patients at all stages of disease by approximately 60%.

We have always been using oral enzyme therapy with all of our cancer patients. This study just strengthens our conviction about how important it is.