(15 DOCTORS OF INTEGRATIVE AND NATUROPATHIC MEDICINE TELL YOU HOW).

Review by Yeong Sek Yee & Khadijah Shaari

In her book (released May 2011), author and medical researcher Connie Strasheim provides the reader with an informative overview of some new and innovative cancer treatments. She identified 15 top cancer healers from the United States and five other countries and then spent the better part of the 2010 interviewing them. The 15 physicians interviewed included medical doctors, osteopaths and naturopaths who treat cancer either exclusively or as a major part of their practice.

Most people, when confronted with cancer in our society, are quickly shunted into typical surgery, chemotherapy and radiation protocols. Standard medical treatment offers little variation from person to person, and after chemotherapy or radiation, patients are left with impaired immunity, toxicities, fatigue and emotional uncertainty. As substantiated by several of the doctors in the book, these conventional treatments don’t have a great long-term track record despite all the money spent on cancer therapy and research.

Strasheim’s interviews with these fifteen different doctors focus on integrating the best conventional wisdom with nutritional supplements, Traditional Chinese Medicine, diet, lifestyle and a wide variety of modalities that help balance body, mind and spirit. Although each doctor employs his or her own set of techniques and protocols, the reader soon understands that there are some common themes among their approaches.

The doctors interviewed present a solid perspective on what options are available to a person facing cancer. They have been trained in a variety of medical disciplines including, but not limited to, allopathic (conventional), naturopathic, homeopathic, biological, and Traditional Chinese medicine. Some of the tools like Insulin Potentiation Therapy (IPT) and specific tumor drug testing (chemosensitivity tests) make so much sense that it is a pity they fall short of the “Standard of Care” procedures followed by the medical establishment. There is a wealth of information for anyone who is interested in pursuing a kinder and gentler cancer therapy.

Each chapter of the book focuses on the treatment approach of a single physician. All aspects of treatment are covered, from anti-neoplastic (anti-cancer) remedies and immune system support, to dietary and lifestyle choices that result in the best outcomes for patients. The book also offers unique insights into healing, such as the pros and cons of different treatments and how to intelligently use chemotherapy. It discusses patient and practitioner challenges to healing, factors that affect healing, treatment outcomes and how to effectively combine multiple medical strategies to obtain the best results. Finally, it offers helpful insights to the friends and families of those coping with cancer.

In this short review, it is impossible to summarize the contents of the 15 interviews. The list of questions asked by the author is sufficient to fill the book with 443 pages of well documented information. Here are some of the questions asked:

1. What is cancer? What causes it?
2. What is your treatment approach? How effective is it for different types and stages of cancer?
3. What are your treatment outcomes and can you provide statistics on your success for treating late-stage cancers?
4. What are your dietary recommendations for those with cancer?
5. What lifestyle recommendations do you suggest for people with cancer?
6. Describe the role of emotional trauma/emotions in healing from cancer. Do you recommend that your patients do any type of spiritual/psychological therapies as part of their healing process? How integral are these to their healing?
7. Do you recommend detoxification therapies to your patients? If so, which ones?
8. What supportive treatments do you recommend, besides those described in your main protocol? Do you believe that supporting the hormones, for example, should be an important part of treatment?
9. Are there any treatments, either within conventional or natural medicine, which are dangerous and/or ineffective
10. How can friends and family support their loved ones with cancer?
11. What do you wish that more people with cancer knew when seeking    out treatments?
12. How does medical politics influence the availability of effective treatments?
13. What else do you want readers to know about your work as a cancer practitioner?
14. What factors influence healing?
15. What are your final words of wisdom for cancer patients?

And the 15 physicians interviewed are:

• Stanislaw Burzynski, MD, PhD, Houston, Texas
• Robert Zieve, MD, Prescott, Arizona
• Nicholas Gonzalez, MD, New York, New York
• Finn Scott Anderson, MD, Humlebæk, Denmark
• Juergen Winkler, MD, Oceanside, California
• Dr. Rivera-Celaya, MD and his assistant Steven Hines, Ciudad Acuña, Coahuila, Mexico
• Colleen Huber, NMD, Tempe, Arizona
• Robert Eslinger, DO, Reno, Nevada
• Dr. Dayton, DO, Sunny Isles Beach, Florida
• Dr. Reis, MD, Bad Mergentheim, Germany
• Julian Kenyon, MD, London, England
• Constantine Kotsanis, MD, Grapevine, Texas
• Joe Brown, ND, Tempe, Arizona
• Keith Scott-Mumby, MD, Reno, Nevada
• Chad Aschtgen, ND, Seattle, Washington.

To find out more about the book and Connie Strasheim, visit her website at http://cancerbooksource.com/defeat-cancer-book/

On YouTube, you can view two videos on the subject:

1)   New Cancer Book Interviews 15 Doctors from 5 Countries

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhxdeJbUyyU

2)   Medical Book Review: Defeat Cancer: 15 Doctors of Integrative & Naturopathic Medicine Tell You How

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsbL7YHZgsQ

This book very clearly indicates to cancer patients that there are many healing choices for cancer…the conventional modalities of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation is just one of the many choices. Some other books you may want to refer to are:

1)   CANCER: IS THERE ANOTHER OPTION? by Dr Chris K.H.Teo, PhD

2)   CANCER: WHAT NOW? by Dr Chris K.H.Teo, PhD

3)   DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO CANCER by Dr Burton Goldberg

4)   CANCER THERAPY by Dr Ralph Moss, PhD

5)   CANCER: INCREASING YOUR ODDS FOR SURVIVAL by David Bognar

6)   KNOCKOUT: INTERVIEWS WITH DOCTORS WHO ARE CURING CANCER by Suzanne Somers.

Besides the above (which your doctor/oncologist will advise you not to read), there are many other books on complementary and alternative healing modalities for cancer. But invariably, your doctor/oncologist will gun you down if you ever mention any of them….not scientifically tested, proven, etc, etc, etc.  Amen.

by Yeong Sek Yee  & Khadijah

Written by Dr. Charles Majors, Dr. Ben Lerner and Sayer Ji, The Cancer Killers book aims to help you understand more about the disease of Cancer, the business of Cancer and the risks of conventional Cancer treatments.

Dr Charles Major has a doctorate in Chiropractic. In September 2010, Dr Majors was diagnosed with advanced Plasmacytoma, a form of Multiple Myeloma that had metastasized to his brain. He chose to leave conventional medicine (but he did surgery) and applied the same principles he had been teaching for years to reverse his own cancer and not only survives but thrives.

You can listen to Dr Majors explaining the book at the following YouTube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xn69pHP_n8A

In addition, you can listen to Dr Major’s cancer journey at a Webinar at the following link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRlegoDXdHs

The other authors, Dr Ben Lerner, is the co-founder of the Maximized Living Foundation and Sayer Ji, is the founder and editor-in-chief of GreenMedInfo.com

In the book, you will learn and begin to see how you have it within you to fight off all diseases and help your immune system do what it is designed to do—to keep you healthy! You will also learn what foods are good for you, which ones need to be avoided and even how much exercise is optimum for health.

According to the authors, your body is a cancer killing machine. Equipped with a high powered immune system and intracellular anti-oxidant defense system, you have the ability to prevent and reverse cancer. They believe that there is one cause for cancer and the cause is anything that interferes with your body’s ability to kill cancer and fight off any disease. Likewise, there is one cure—remove the interference and maximize the potential.

Your goal is to develop a cause-addressing lifestyle that is no longer a destructive force in your life, but rather a force to help your body protect itself now and in the future. The following are the authors’ 5 main cancer-killing essentials:

1)    Maximized Mindset—the mind has great influence over the body…constant stress and negative thinking suppresses the body’s immune system, alters digestive functions, and causes the continual production of negative, stress hormones.

2)    Maximized Nerve Supply—spinal correction care re-aligns the spine, restores the curves, and make sure the skull and pelvis is aligned…this corrects the cause, removes the interference and maximizes function. With spinal correction, the nerve supply can be restored.

3)    Maximized Quality Nutrition—bad eating leads to insulin insensitivity, hormone imbalance, thyroid dysfunction, poor bowel movement, toxicity and cell inflammation. Today’s commercial diets contain endless toxins and lack the nutrients, fiber and antioxidants, etc.

4)    Maximized Oxygen and Lean Muscle—oxygen has been shown to stymie the growth of cancers. The lack of exercise causes malfunction and interferes with the body’s ability to kill the enemy.

5)    Minimized Toxins—toxic materials cannot be effectively metabolized by the body…these poisons are accumulated or built up in your system and create a “toxic burden.”

Dr. Majors also described his own personal experience with Stage IV cancer and how he found his path to recovery through simple (yet obviously effective) ways of living (listen to the Webinar by Dr Majors). When diagnosed in September 2010, he declined the conventional Cut, Poison and Burn procedures (read Chapter 4). The opening paragraph of the chapter summed up his reasons:

• Conventional cancer treatments are the medical equivalent of fighting fire with fire. To kill a cancerous growth, medicine employs something equally hazardous. It bombards the patient with toxic chemicals and radiation, both of which are considered lethal….the doctors hope that the cancer cells will be more susceptible to their potent wallop than the healthy cells. The reality, however is that “collateral damage” from the treatments is inevitable. It is not a matter of “if,” but to what degree the damaging side effects will take their toll.
• The DNA damaging effects of chemotherapy and radiation are actual causes of cancer initiation and promotion. Therefore the standard of care in cancer treatment is also a cause of cancer.

In summary, Dr Majors reiterated that “you cannot poison yourself back into health”

Cancer, like all illnesses, is a symptom. It is a result of something weakened and not working right in your body. You have to learn how to strengthen your body and make things right, so that illnesses cannot grow and thrive within you.

That is the ultimate cancer killer in you.

FURTHER REFERENCES:

1)    Website of Sayers Ji….GREENMEDINFO…..http://www.greenmedinfo.com/

(Lots of information on cancer which your doctors will not tell you)

2)    Visit them on their FACEBOOK page at….https://www.facebook.com/BeACancerKiller

By Yeong Sek Yee & Khadijah Shaari

 Conventional cancer treatments, especially the chemotherapeutic agents are toxic and can cause a great deal of collateral damage to the body besides the nausea, vomiting and hair loss that your doctor tells you about. Collateral damage is damage to things that are incidental to the intended target and this is best illustrated by Dr. David Levy, former president of the British Columbia Cancer Agency, Canada:

• “In fighting the war on cancer, there is, like in any war, unwanted collateral damage. There is no silver bullet, but in many ways, a refined shotgun, blasting the tumour while pellets hit other vital organs.
• ·         “The bone marrow, liver, and nervous system get their share of hits, but the heart and vascular system are certainly at risk depending on the weapon used, particularly because the vascular system and blood supply are intimately involved in any treatment delivery.

Link:http://blogs.vancouversun.com/2010/09/25/the-heart-collateral-damage-from-cancer-treatment/

Dr Russell Blaylock, a neurosurgeon, described other more serious collateral damage such as depressed production of blood-forming cells, cardiac toxicity, pulmonary complications, gastrointestinal complications, liver injury, kidney and neurological complications in Chapter 3….Chemotherapy: Poisoning Cancer (and You) in the New York bestseller, NATURAL STRATEGIES FOR CANCER PATIENTS. 

In 2012, Dr Margaret I. Cuomo, MD, a board- certified radiologist, published A WORLD WITHOUT CANCER. In Chapter 7, “Cancer’s Collateral Damage,” Dr Cuomo described the cancer journey of Toni, a 50 year old artist and her husband Doug, a golf professional and how the couple saw “the darkest side of our current cancer care paradigm” The couple endured Toni’s frequent hospitalizations, the debilitating side effects of one cancer drug after another, false hope, and a mounting pile of bills. Their ordeal ended with Toni’s death less than 4 years later after her diagnosis of lymphoma.

Below is Toni’s sad story as told by Dr Cuomo in her book:

In late November 2007, Toni, was diagnosed with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, a common form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Scans revealed Toni had an especially aggressive cancer with tumors scattered across her abdominal area and elsewhere. Still, her oncologist spoke optimistically about the package of treatment options available, and she was co-operative and prepared for the fight.

After surgery to remove the tumors, Toni began a six-cycle regimen of chemotherapy, receiving an eight-hour infusion every few weeks. By the third round, she could barely move from her bed between infusions, but she persevered, and at the end of June 2008, Toni and her husband Doug, received good news. “We got it” her doctors proclaimed. Everyone believed the cancer was gone.

Toni was told she would have to return for scans every three months for the first year, and then less frequently. Doug remembers the doctor saying, “After five years, you won’t have to come back at all.”

Weakened by the chemotherapy, Toni spent much of the summer and fall regaining her strength. Life for the couple was good again. Until March 2009, that is, when a post-treatment scan showed that the cancer had recurred and had spread. Toni’s oncologist suggested that she would be a good candidate for a bone marrow transplant, which had to be done at a cancer center about 100 miles from their home.

After learning more about the rigorous and difficult procedure – including claims (by their oncologist) that it had a 95% success rate – Toni agreed to begin treatment.

Additional potent chemotherapy had to come first. This time, Toni was admitted to the local hospital, where she received chemotherapy around the clock for three days every three weeks. A post-chemo scan again showed no evidence of cancer, and the couple headed to the cancer center, ready for the bone marrow transplant. Their insurance company had already said yes to the US$400,000 treatment. It was July 2009.

The first step was to harvest Toni’s bone marrow stem cells, which took eight hours a day over five consecutive days. Another week of chemotherapy came next, and then the stem cells were infused back into her body during a four-hour procedure.

She remained hospitalized for the next three weeks, as the stem cells started to grow again. Once, her blood pressure plunged and her platelet levels dropped to dangerously low levels, bringing her perilously close to death.

Although she recovered, Toni’s health had been compromised, and remained so after her release from the hospital. Shortly afterward, her temperature spiked to 105 F, a fungal infection was found in her lungs, and she was readmitted for further treatment. The fungus might have been there for a long time, held in check until her immune system was weakened by chemotherapy and could no longer fight the latent infection. Her antifungal medicine cost US$5,600 a month.

Toni was finally able to return home in late October 2009, although the demands of continuing treatment and follow up meant the couple had to make weekly four-hour round-trip drives to the hospital.

In February 2010, Toni returned for a scan, expecting it to show that the bone marrow transplant had worked. The couple thought this would be their moment of triumph, a second chance for a longer life. Instead, they learned that Toni still had evidence of cancer. A year of suffering had been in vain.

Her doctors suggested another transplant. Nothing else will work, they said. Toni balked. “No,” she said. “You didn’t have to go through what I went through. You didn’t almost die. You’re not the ones who didn’t have any quality of life for almost a year.” Then, she added quietly, “I don’t know whether or not we can afford it”

The doctor’s response: “You don’t have to worry. Your insurance company paid for everything the first time. It will pay for everything again.”

That wasn’t quite true, of course. “Insurance didn’t pay for us to live away from home for eight months,” Doug recalls. “It didn’t pay for a lot of the drugs Toni needed, It didn’t pay for the fact that both of us were out of work for quite some time. The insurance company covers the medical cost, but it doesn’t cover the costs of the disease.”

Even so, they decided to try another transplant. Over the next few months, more health problems intervened. Toni’s spleen swelled to five times its normal size, her white blood cell count plunged and she developed pneumonia. Meanwhile, scans showed that her cancer kept surging.

Still, the doctors insisted she remained a candidate for the transplant. The procedure was scheduled, canceled, rescheduled, and canceled once more.

As many patients do when they have exhausted all other options, Toni entered a clinical trial, this one assessing a new combination drug treatment. Beginning in April 2011, the couple began making regular trips to the hospital for the protocol. With the tumors shrinking, the punishing treatment schedule seemed worth it. The second bone marrow transplant again seemed possible.

Then, new obstacles arose. When Toni complained of headaches, invasive tests revealed that lymphoma cells had invaded her cerebral spinal fluid. The cancer was in her brain.

Yet another drug treatment option was put on the table, but this time her oncologist was finally ready to advise against it. “You can do this if you want, but I don’t recommend it”, he said bluntly. “You will be in the hospital for six months. It’ll be hell, and then you will die.”

Toni’s fight was over. The doctor said that she would probably survive until Thanksgiving but doubted that she would make it to Christmas. On September 29, 2011, Toni’s courageous four-year battle came to an end. She was 54.

When illness first occurred, Toni and Doug had steady jobs, good insurance, and friends willing to help. The couple incurred US$50,000 in out-of-pocket medical costs and another US$150,000 in living expenses, including bills for hotels, food, and gas. After long periods without a regular income, the couple couldn’t meet their monthly obligations. Decades of careful savings vanished.

Doug wondered now if they were given false hope. “Had we known the full extent of what was ahead, I don’t think we would have gone through what we did,” he says. Was what we went through done to teach somebody else? Or was it done for the revenue?

It is hard for him not to feel cynical about the agenda of those in the cancer industry and the influence of money on decision making. “In my heart, I believe if we wanted to find a cure for cancer, we would have done so a long time ago,” Doug said. “I don’t believe the medical profession wants to find a cure. They would like to find effective treatments for cancer, but a cure? No. There would be too many people out of work.”

“I truly believe,” he adds, “that if our insurance hadn’t paid the doctors as well as it did, they wouldn’t have encouraged us to keep on with treatment.”

Dr Cuomo’s concluding remarks:

Understandably, Doug may be a bit harsh in his judgment of Toni’s physicians. Treating people with cancer is a delicate and tricky process, with oncologists trying to keep their patients alive by staying one step ahead of the disease. It is hard to know just how much extra gain can be achieved, at what price, and exactly when the struggle becomes futile. Right now, most therapy buys patients with advanced cancer only a little more time.

Postscript

Another sad story is that of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis who was diagnosed with NHL in Jan 1994. She received chemotherapy and radiation treatments at the prestigious New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Centre. The New York Times reported that she “initially responded to therapy, but it (the cancer) came back in her brain and spread through her body.”

For the unrelenting pain in her neck, Mrs. Onassis received more drugs. For the acute pneumonia she developed in her weakened state, she received more drugs. Steroids were part of the mixture in her chemotherapy, which caused a perforated ulcer in her stomach. In the middle of her ordeal, she had to be operated on to sew up the hole in her stomach.

She went from bad to worse, and as a final assault on her body, she was subjected to even more radiation and chemotherapy, only this time it was shot directly into her brain. The cancer spread to her spinal cord, her liver, and throughout the body. She became weak and disoriented, lost weight, developed shaking chills, her speech slowed, and she had difficulty walking.

Mrs. Onassis passed away in May 1994…..just 5 months after diagnosis.

Similarly, King Hussein of Jordan was diagnosed with NHL July 1998 and began 6 months of chemotherapy and 2 bone marrow transplants. King Hussein passed away in Feb 1999 at age 63……..just 8 months after diagnosis.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

In the stories of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and King Hussein of Jordan, was it a case of excessive collateral damage or did the chemotherapy drugs spread the cancer? How come scientifically tested, evidence-based medicine could not save them then or was the lymphoma too aggressive?

We welcome your thoughts.