Healing Cancer with Integrative and Naturopathic Medicine

It is my view that medical politics and pharmaceutical interests have heavily influenced and limited people’s access to beneficial cancer treatments. In conventional medicine, chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery are usually the only treatments offered to cancer patients, but they aren’t always effective.

While conventional medicine has proven to be useful for treating a handful of cancers, such as childhood leukemia, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and testicular cancer, overall its track record has been dismal. Conventional medicine fails to effectively treat most other types of cancer, unless the cancer is diagnosed in the very early stages (most people don’t get diagnosed until their cancers are advanced). Even then, it’s only effective for some types of cancer, such as breast, prostate or non-melanoma skin cancers.

In my recently released book, Defeat Cancer: 15 Doctors of Integrative and Naturopathic Medicine Tell You How, Robert Eslinger, DO, states, “From 1990-2004, over 150,000 people with all types of cancer were studied, and it was found that only 2.1 per cent of them were still alive after five years. All had done full-dose chemotherapy.” These results were published in a 2004 edition of the Journal of Clinical Oncology. Eslinger adds that more than 250 billion dollars have been spent on cancer research over the past 60 years, and yet the cure rate for cancer hasn’t improved much since 1950.

Additionally, conventional treatments are often inappropriately prescribed, and can be inadequate in the absence of a holistic approach that includes botanicals, dietary modifications, and other therapies which augment the effects of anti-neoplastic (anti-cancer) therapies.

Integrative, naturopathic, and other types of holistic medicine now offer alternative solutions. These treatments have effectively helped many people with cancer to live long, productive lives. Integrative medicine takes the best of conventional, naturopathic, and other medical disciplines such as Traditional Chinese Medicine and homeopathy, to formulate protocols that treat the underlying cause of disease, rather than just its symptoms. Doctors of integrative medicine share the goal of treating patients with whatever works, regardless of medical politics or other non-beneficial influences.

ALTERNATIVE CANCER THERAPIES CURRENTLY OFFERED WORLDWIDE

The effectiveness of many naturopathic and integrative cancer treatments has been proven in clinical studies and in doctors’ experiences with their patients. Some of these treatments include:

1) INSULIN POTENTIATION THERAPY (IPT), which utilizes the hormone insulin to make natural anti-cancer substances more effective. Insulin causes cancer cells to open up their receptors to sugar, which means that doctors can administer anti-cancer herbs, for instance, or chemotherapeutic drugs, along with glucose, at one-tenth of a normal full dose, and these substances will be more effective than if the patient had been given the full dose. IPT also doesn’t destroy the immune system in the same way that full-dose chemotherapy can, so the body has a better chance of fighting the cancer. Many good doctors of integrative medicine, such as Arizona’s Robert Zieve, MD, and California’s Juergen Winkler, MD, utilize IPT as part of a comprehensive, holistic approach to healing. (1,2,3,4,5)

2) METRONOMIC LOW-DOSE CYCLOPHOSPHAMIDE, which is a natural chemotherapy agent that functions to destroy tumour blood vessels and stop angiogenesis, or new tumour blood vessel formation. Cancer cells get their nutrition via blood vessels, so stopping tumour blood vessel growth removes the cancer’s access to that nutrition. When people with cancer take very low doses of cyclophosphamide every other day, it can shrink or eliminate their tumours. In any case, it keeps the cancer from growing and doing further harm to the body. Finn Skott Andersen, MD, of Humlegaarden clinic in Denmark, uses metronomic low-dose cyclophosphamide and other natural chemotherapy agents as part of his cancer treatment protocols. (6)

3) ANTINEOPLASTONS, which are naturally occurring peptides and amino acid derivatives that the body makes to control cancer growth. They can also be biochemically synthesized to aid the body in its fight against cancer. These antineoplastons turn off the activity of the genes in the body that cause cancer, and turn on the genes that suppress it. Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski, MD, of Houston, Texas, is renowned worldwide for his work with antineoplastons. He has been able to successfully put a high percentage of his patients who have failed both chemotherapy and radiation into remission using antineoplastons. These were patients who were told that nothing else could be done for them. Dr. Burzynski currently trains other physicians from around the world in the use of these agents. (7,8) (Editor’s note: To read Helke Ferrie’s review of Burzynski, The Movie, go to: https://vitalitymagazine.com/article/book-reviewsreviewburzynski-the-movie-dvd/)

4) PANCREATIC ENZYMES – The early 1900s English scientist John Beard discovered that cancer cells look and behave much like placental cells, and developed a theory that cancer cells come from residual placental (trophoblast) cells that are found in everyone. Beard realized that placental cell growth in a fetus stops when the fetus develops a pancreas and starts producing pancreatic enzymes. Correspondingly, he discovered that high doses of pancreatic enzymes were effective for stopping cancer cell growth. At his cancer clinic in New York, Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez, MD, has perfected the use of pancreatic enzymes to treat cancer, and has had tremendous success in putting many patients with late-stage cancers into remission using this approach, which also involves specific therapeutic diets based on metabolic typing, as well as coffee enemas to purge dead cancer tissue from the body. (9,10)

(Editor’s note: To read a feature by Helke Ferrie on the remarkable work of Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez, go to: https://bit.ly/q2udmc  To purchase the 2-set DVD of Dr. Gonzalez’s lecture at Whole Life Expo 2010, entitled “Alternative Medicine Takes on Cancer and Wins” – ($28.00) call Kos Publishing at (519) 927-1049 to order.)

5) MISTLETOE, which is an anti-cancer herb that has been used extensively to treat cancer in Europe since the early 1900s. Mistletoe acts upon cancer in various ways, by preventing angiogenesis, directly killing cancer cells, and stimulating the immune system. It also reduces the side effects of conventional treatments. The components of mistletoe which make it useful in cancer treatment include viscotoxins, alkaloids, and lectins. (11)

6) PUERARIN – According to Keith Scott-Mumby, MD, one of the pioneers of alternative medicine in the United Kingdom, puerarin is an estrogen-blocking herb which is an excellent alternative to Tamoxifen, a drug commonly prescribed to block the effects of estrogen upon cancer cells in women with breast cancer. According to Dr. Mumby, this herb comes from a region in Thailand where breast cancer is virtually unheard of. (12)

7) HYPERTHERMIA – Local and whole body hyperthermia, which is also widely used in European cancer clinics. This treatment heats tumour cells and causes apoptosis, or programmed cell death. Hyperthermia is a very effective adjunct cancer treatment. (13)

8) SONO AND PHOTODYNAMIC THERAPY – Photodynamic therapy involves giving patients light-sensitive substances (usually chemical compounds called porphyrins, which are breakdown products from recycled hemoglobin, although chlorophyll derivatives can also be used) that accumulate preferentially in cancer cells.  Patients then lie on a light bed, which activates the light-sensitive agents via light diodes and creates a chemical reaction that destroys tumour cells. Sonodynamic therapy operates on a similar principle, except ultrasound is used instead of a light bed to activate the light-sensitive substances. Julian Kenyon, MD, Medical Director of the Dove Clinic in the United Kingdom, developed both of these techniques at his clinics. (14)

9) VITAMIN C – When administered in high doses, Vitamin C has a pro-oxidant, rather than anti-oxidant, effect against cancer cells (and yet it doesn’t harm normal cells!). One of the byproducts of vitamin C, when it is broken down, is hydrogen peroxide which tumour cells don’t tolerate well. Fortunately, vitamin C doesn’t break down until it reaches the fluid that surrounds cancer cells. There, it kills cancer while leaving healthy tissue unharmed. Many studies have been done which prove the anti-cancer benefits of both oral and intravenous vitamin C. (15,16)

10) BETA GLUCANS, THYMUS PEPTIDE EXTRACTS – Immune-boosting substances, such as 1-3, 1-6 beta glucans and thymus peptide extracts. Beta glucans derived from baker’s yeast are known to be among the most effective substances for stimulating the innate immune system, which tends to be weak in people with cancer. Thymus peptide extracts stimulate the immune system to produce more immune cells in the bone marrow, and train mature immune cells to support an active defence system in the body. Nina Reis, MD, of Hufeland Klinik, in Bad Mergentheim, Germany, is one physician who uses these as an integral part of her cancer treatment protocols. (17,18)

Other effective treatments for cancer include: melatonin, homeopathy, Poly-MVA, fever and oxygen therapies.

THE IMPORTANCE OF A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO HEALING

In addition to the abovementioned anti-cancer treatments, successful doctors of integrative and natural medicine take a holistic approach to healing, which means addressing all of the factors in their patients that are enabling their cancers to flourish. These factors include: heavy metal and other environmental toxicities; co-morbid conditions and infections such as Lyme disease; a poor diet; emotional trauma; and unhealthy lifestyle habits.  Therefore, ridding the body of toxins and other infections, healing trauma and relationships, balancing hormones, organs and whatever else might be harming the patient, are integral components of any holistic healing protocol for cancer.

Finally, people with cancer should know that there is no such thing as a “one-size-fits-all” treatment protocol for cancer in integrative or any other type of medicine. “Cookie cutter” protocols don’t work for most patients. Everyone is unique and requires an individualized, customized treatment approach by physicians experienced in integrative cancer treatment.

NEVER LOSE HOPE

There are good, accessible treatment solutions that are being used by doctors of naturopathic and integrative medicine, in Canada as well as abroad, that may enable people with cancer to live for years beyond their initial prognoses, no matter the type or stage of cancer that they have.