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Much like David's posting, where he thinks these people were cured by chemotherapy, I have had experiences where people died from chemotherapy and others who have lived without it.
I have a very good friend who had colo/rectal surgery in 1995 (a year before my wife's chest surgery) with 12 lymph nodes resected (he was 68 years of age). The same oncologists who went after my wife in 1997, went after my friend to receive chemo and/or radiation, but the surgeon told them "no". The surgeon was very confident he did a very thoro job. My friend obliged the surgeon and refused further treatment. He is now 76 years old and "fit as a fiddle". He always remembered what had happened to my wife and has been very greatful he made the right decision.
I lost one of my aunts last year to the side effects of breast cancer treatment. Her daughters allowed her to have a lumpectomy with concomitant chemotherapy and whole chest radiation. To a seventy-nine year old, it is like hammering nails on her coffin. Her death was from terminal infections that invade the body after the persons immune system is destroyed by chemo/radiation. Breast cancer is a common type of cancer called Adenocarcinoma. Adenocarcinoma is a type of cancer which does not respond well to chemo or radiation. The chance of curing it is probably less than 10%, according to a clinical investigators at the National Cancer Institute.
And, I personally lost my wife to the side effects of chemotherapy. I feel that my wife's life was greatly shortened and neurologically deteriorated by the chemo and radiation treatments received at our local hometown hospital. In patients, such as my wife, chemo and radiation treatments are particularly tragic and there is no survival benefit or prolonged independence. The patient cannot experience the beneficial improvement in quality of life. A slow, arduous, neurological death is not preferable to a cancerous death.
The moral is it is important for patients and their loved ones to be fully informed about all of their options in therapy, with their potential benefits and risks. Patients need to be given all of the knowledge they need to make an informed decision regarding their course of care.
Death by "side effects of treatment" is not the same as "complications of cancer". A lot of cancer patients who succumb to their disease get the wrong information on their death certificates. They die with incorrect, incomplete or misleading diagnosis. Often it will say they died of heart failure, kidney failure, liver failure or lung failure. These can be side effects of cancer treatment as well as progression of the cancer. They are lumped together reducing the general understanding of the impact of cancer. And a lot of oncologists get away with camouflaging their negliegent mistakes.
In Reply to: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy posted by Greg Pawelski on March 21, 2003 at 22:48:43:
Thanks, Greg.
In my opinion, chemo is a dead-end cancer therapy. Personally I would NEVER have it done to me!
Namaste`
Walt
In Reply to: Re: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy (Archive in cancer.) posted by Walt Stoll on March 22, 2003 at 08:53:00:
Hello Dr. Stoll,
I was just curious how YOU would treat your cancer...?
During a visit to my local healh food store, I stuck up a conversation with a person that recommended your site. This gentleman had a kidney tumor and was taking the MGN. He was going Alternative all the way to beat his cancer! Are there any reference sites that confirm cancer has gone into remission with Alternative Medicine?
A very close friend just has been diagnosed with skin cancer....stage 4, spread to the bone and lymph nodes. She is now recoving from surgery, and her Oncologist wants her to take treatment in MD. (she resides in MI)
Any input would be appreciated.
Thanks and enjoy your day...
Ginger
In Reply to: Re: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy (Archive in cancer.) posted by Ginger on March 22, 2003 at 20:41:30:
Thanks, Ginger.
It would depend a bit upon the kind of cancer.
However, in general, I would start something like a Macrobiotic Diet (Call Cancer Control Society at (213) 663-7801), begin doing SR with imagery (Carl Simonton "Getting Well Again") at least 3 times a day, start a walking exercise program and take "Perfect Food" by gardenoflifeusa.com along with at least 5 grams of esterified vitamin C 3 times a day.
Hope this helps.
Walt
In Reply to: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy posted by Greg Pawelski on March 21, 2003 at 22:48:43:
Greg:
Thanks for the information. I had chemotherapy and it did not stop my breast cancer. It damaged my body and I went down hill after having it.
The oncologists are still trying to push it on me, but I absolutely refuse!!!!!!
I am disabled and dying because of allopathic treatments for breast cancer.
It makes me angry that doctors buy and sell chemo for huge profits, especially when often times the chemo doesn't help the patient.
If chemo was such a life-saver then one American wouldn't be dying from cancer every minute.
Pam
In Reply to: Re: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy (Archive in cancer.) posted by Walt Stoll on March 23, 2003 at 09:46:22:
After I had a run in with breast cancer six years ago, I did a lot of looking around for alternatives in case it recurs. I recalled Dr. David Williams writing in his Alternatives newsletter about shark cartilage early in the 1990's. He described the research of the people who were using it in other countries, as it could not be used in the US. The FDA, you know! In fact, after too many successes in treating otherwise untreatable cancers, the FDA ran the person who researched using shark cartilage and developed it "out of town" with a bogus suit (he settled for a million dollars, but Dr. Lane's web site is nothing now compared to what it was). Now his site is like any other source of food supplements and similar products. It once had a forum like this, with dozens of posters, those seeking help, and those who had heartwarming testimonials to give).
A friend of mine also had a minute breast cancer, treated with total mastectomy, and reconstruction, which was diagnosed and treated shortly before mine. But her cancer soon came roaring back and made swiss cheese of her liver. The surgeon (who had advised her a year or so earlier to "watch and wait") was devastated, and sent her to an oncologist to "buy her some time." The oncodoc did his magic, and declared her "for all practical purposes, cured," as probably only microscopic cells remained. She grew out her hair, healed her mouth sores, and rejoiced in her cure. I figured if I ever got cancer, I wanted her doc to work his magic for me, too! Mine was diagnosed about six months later. It was successfully treated with lumpectomy, and then they talked me into radiation and Tamoxifen, too, even though I was by then VERY well read on the subject, and knew there were dangers to both. I began taking prophylactic doses of shark cartilage, drank lots of wheat grass juice, and did other healthy things, and hoped for the best.
A few months later, her cancer was back again, now Stage IV, and the doc basically told her he could not really stop it. By this time, I became a meddler. I had found out what kind of chemo she was getting. The Web described it as only for Stage IV patients -- I don't recall the name, but it was derived from the vinca plant, I believe -- and the studies at that time revealed that the average life span after beginning it was 25 weeks, with no one living as long as a year. I didn't tell her what I had learned, of course, but I described shark cartilage to her and its method of fighting the cancer by stopping the growth of new blood vessels to feed the cancer (antiangiogenesis). I suggested that she seemed to have little to lose by trying it. She agreed.
I told her to expect that her doc would laugh at her. He did, and told her if it worked, he was going to take the credit for it for his chemo. The shark cartilage is not a poison, and it takes a minimum of 12 or 13 weeks to even begin to show whether it is helping (it does NOT help everybody!). By 25 weeks, one has real evidence if it will hold the cancer at bay (remember, she could otherwise expect to be dead by that time). She was in utter misery from the chemo when she began taking shark cartilage and some immune enhancing products. Her gastrointestinal tract had shut down utterly, extremities were affected, mouth sores -- you name it, she had the side effect. She looked and felt as though she were next to death already. That was in November.
By early February, she was feeling better. At her birthday party with another friend and me, she described the doc's face as he read her blood work reports that day: his eyes widened, and his jaw dropped. Hmmm. He saw something! But did he tell her to keep on keeping on with what she was doing? No. Just reported improved results and let it go at that.
In two or three more months, she was eating like a horse, working full time (both of us were educators), taking recreational classes, AND PLAYING TENNIS TWICE A WEEK. Remember, by this time, most people getting her chemo were dead or near death from the cancer which could not be stopped. She continued in apparently radiant good health, happily continuing the shark cartilage therapy routine, which probably cost her about $20 a day for everything, on through the summer and into the fall.
Then one day in October or November, though she felt no different, her doctor reported that her cancer markers were beginning to creep up again, and he put her back on chemo once again. Her grown son decided to do some Internet sleuthing, and came back to her to report that the shark cartilage was absolute hogwash, it was just a total scam, and she was being "taken." He told her that she ought to save her money. (Gosh, you don't suppose he had found an FDA site on cancer quackery, do you??)
So, she quit the shark cartilage. I saw her a couple of times after that. She looked like she had the year before in the middle of her chemo onslaught. And again, one last time, on her birthday in early February. Three weeks later, she was dead. But she did not die from the cancer!! She died as the result of an opportunistic infection that she could no longer fight. It began as a simple sore throat on Tuesday, and we chatted on the phone about how glad we were that she was complaining about discomfort from a cold, rather than about cancer. The following Monday morning, she called the paramedics, who took her to the hospital, where she died that evening.
Sadly, I learned a couple of years later that people who are successful with the shark cartilage, generally do experience a rising of the cancer marker numbers after a period of good health, just as my friend did. Those who work with many such people theorize that this occurs as the cancer is being overcome and breaking down and sending its poisons into the system to be eliminated! If that is true, my friend stopped just at the point of conquering the cancer, and snatched defeat from the jaws of victory!
I learned about that phenomenon (and a great deal more) from an acquaintance who beat her own "terminal" ovarian cancer, and lived to write a book about it. She still makes herself and her support available to other cancer victims, nearly a decade after her own doctor sent her home to put her affairs in order and await death when his chemo had not stopped her cancer, but had nearly destroyed her!
Oh, yes. That doctor, who was extremely upset that she would follow "quackery" instead of his traditional medicine, was profoundly affected by her curing herself, and experienced such a major sea change -- that he and some other doctors just opened a brand new center in Tucson to treat cancer with both traditional and complementary/alternative methods! Wow! Another medical doctor grows into his M.D.!
So...would I take chemo if my cancer recurs? I will never say "never," but I do know I will never say "OK," twice. I recall reading that the polls of oncologists, asking if they would take their own medicine or give it to a loved one in the case of cancer diagnosis, give a resounding "NO!" 80 percent of the time.
There are so many other things to try, serially, or all at one time, all of them non-invasive and non-poisonous, that I would try instead. I have reached the age of Medicare, and by this many years, have seen too many friends and acquaintances fall under the oncologists' spell -- and then die from their chemo -- to put much faith in them. I love my oncologist -- she is a truly caring and kind and decent person -- but I am content to have her just keep track of my progress. I pray God that is all she ever will need to do for me!
Good luck, and God bless!
In Reply to: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy posted by Greg Pawelski on March 21, 2003 at 22:48:43:
Greg:
Click on my story about how the doctors crippled me with their cut, burn and poison methods for breast cancer. Now, I am dying a horrible death and the doctors have no answers.
Pam
In Reply to: Read My Story posted by Pam on March 23, 2003 at 23:29:30:
Did you read MI's post about shark cartilege?
In Reply to: Re: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy (Archive in cancer.) posted by MI, too! on March 23, 2003 at 23:13:33:
Dear M.I.:
Shark cartilege is proven effective for cancers that have spread. There was a time when people cut shark cartilege with fillers and made money selling something that wasn't as effective.
The president of Seagate has his own organic fishing and farming company. He manufatures his products so there is no middle-man to put fillers in his shark cartilege.
I have listened to him talk, on Doug kaufmann's T.V. Show, about this history of shark cartilege. He has a book of information showing the proof of the purity of his shark products.
I would suggest that anyone who has cancer that has spread, should consider buying shark cartilege from the Seagate company.
Here is the address to the site:
http://www.seagateproducts.com/product-information.html
Hopes this helps someone in need.
Pam
In Reply to: Re: Read My Story posted by Sally on March 24, 2003 at 08:49:08:
Sally:
Thanks for pointing out MIs post.
Pam
In Reply to: Seagate's Shark Cartilege posted by Pam on March 24, 2003 at 19:41:31:
Benefin, from Lane Labs, is the only one I would trust my life to. Never heard of Seagate. I do know that Benefin, and its precursor, Cartilade, were developed by Dr. Lane, whose work came directly from the original antiangiogenesis experiments in the 1980's, and this is the only cartilage used in the experiments which were aired on Sixty Minutes, after a large percentage of the "terminal" cancer patients they filmed in a Cuban study either went into remission or had their cancers stabilized. It is also the brand that is being used in controlled clinical studies now, here in the United States.
Nothing against Seagate, mind you. I don't know anything about them. But I do know quite a bit about Benefin, and that is the one that had my friend on the mend and in glowing health, until her nitwit son told her to stop taking it. But now that the FDA moved in on them, they cannot even mention the word cancer in connection with their product, so the only way you will ever hear about it is by word of mouth, such as this message. And if Seagate is advertising that they are curing cancer with their shark cartilage, it is only a matter of time until the Feds move on them, too. Unless, of course, they don't get a very big following. They won't bother them until/unless they are successful and become a threat to the cancer industry.
Well, the trial lawyers own the Democrats lock, stock, and barrel, and the pharmaceutical houses probably have a lot of Republicans in their pockets, so it is only we ourselves who are going to be able to help ourselves.
In Reply to: The Man Who Questions Chemotherapy posted by Greg Pawelski on March 21, 2003 at 22:48:43:
I've always felt the way my wife was treated for her ovarian cancer back in 1972 was the reason she survived so long. she was cured with total abdominal hysterectomy and Chlorambucil (Leukeren) treatment. Her type of treatment sounds very similar to the Angiogenesis & Low Dose Chemotherapy treatment that is finding increasing acceptance in cancer centers today. Her postoperative chemotherapy drug was among the slowest acting and least toxic of the alkylating agents. Depression of the immune system is slow and reversible, allowing it to regenerate and contribute to healing. The lower-dose regimen was meant to attack the blood vessels that feed the tumor. Tumors create their own supply lines by secreting substances that stimulate the formation of new blood vessels and researchers suspect that frequent low doses of certain drugs may disrupt the growth of those new vessels, starving the tumor (she also may have had some of her own anti-angiogenesis predisposition).
Of course, when caught at the earliest stage, ovarian cancer has a good prognosis. On average, most of surgical oncology is curative (62%), At Stage I, ovarian cancer has a five-year survival rate of around 93%. My wife's life was extended not because of chemotherapy or radiation therapy but because of great, competent surgical care and an intacted immune system. She went twenty-four years before experiencing any recurrent ovarian cancer.
The effectiveness of some chemotherapy regimens is limited because when cancer is detected in its late stages most patients develop resistance to chemotherapy drugs. Virtually all cancers contain cells resistant to chemotherapy and the number of drug-resistant cells increases exponentially as a tumor expands in size. Since chemotherapy suppresses the immune system, it is possible that new tumors are allowed to grow because the patient has been rendered unable to resist them. A person who just maybe is cured of cancer by these drastic means may find himself struggling with a new, drug-induced tumor a few years later.
Once recurrence occurred, it was the chemotherapy (dose-intense taxol/carboplatin) and radiation treatment (whole brain radiation) that was her demise (not cancer, not surgery).
In regards to alternative cancer treatments, I do not know very much about them. However, I cannot condemn anyone who choses to utilize them if they had gotten all of the information about the benefits and the risks to make that decision.
In Reply to: Re: Read My Story posted by Pam on March 24, 2003 at 19:43:10:
You're welcome, Pam. I see the stuff is very expensive due to being labor intensive. Have you tried it or has it been out of reach for you? Isn't there some organization out there to help you if that's the case?
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