What is cancer?
Cancer is uncontrolled growth. A cancer occurs when the body's own cells
ignore information from other cells to stop growing and continue to expand. As they expand, they lose focus on their purpose
in the body and will travel to other parts of the body and continue growing.
In the process of continually expanding, cancer cells deplete the body
of nutrition and may grow to block essential body functions. Ultimately, people with advanced cancer generally die of malnutrition
or from organ failure as a result of massive tumor growth.
Throughout our lifetimes, multiple cancers appear in our bodies. These
are mistakes of individual cells, and the body's immune system deals effectively with the vast majority of these cells. Only
when the immune system is compromised by other factors (radiation exposure, organ failure or compromise, chronic stress response)
can the cancerous cells expand unchecked. Even after a cancer is detected, the body's immune system can still correct the
problem.
What about the standard treatments?
All of the basic treatments: cutting, chemo, and radiation, deplete the
rapidly growing cancer cells. None of them cure the cancer, a task that must ultimately be accomplished by the body. But they
can be helpful in lessening the amount of work the body must do. In some cases, they are absolutely necessary because they
maximize the chances for recovery. In other cases they may not be helpful, especially when the cancer is in multiple locations.
What do I do?
I help the body recover from the standard treatments and maximize the body's
immune response. Different cancers have different specific needs, and I individualize my treatment to the problem at hand.
An individualized treatment plan will probably include: dietary changes, lifestyle changes, an exercise program, counseling,
supplementation suggestions during and after therapy, and individual goal setting for post treatment outcomes.
Because the vast majority of patients undergo a combination of standard
treatments, much of the initial work needs to support the regular body function while not interfering with the standard treatments.
Breast Cancer: A Naturopathic Look
Diet:
Eating a diet high in fruits and vegetables increases breast cancer
survival. Losing weight will also help if the person was previously obese. Nutr 2002 Nov;132(11 Suppl):3504S-3507S
Werbach's studies of diet and breast cancer risk give the following tips:
Ethanol increases breast cancer risk, as does sugar consumption. Red meat consumption adds to breast cancer mortality, while
fish has a protective effect. High fiber may be protective. A vegetarian diet is protective, if only because of the lowered
estrogen intake. Milk is questionable, because its whey protein helps in glutathione synthesis but the milk fat is harmful. Skim
milk may be beneficial. Soy products may be helpful as a competitive estrogen inhibitor. A number of supplements may be helpful,
and water should be filtered to avoid chlorine and/or fluoride exposure.
During chemotherapy, avoid turmeric because many chemotherapeutic
drugs generate (oxidation) and turmeric is a very powerful antioxidant. Women not undergoing chemo should increase turmeric.
Cancer Res 2002 Jul 1;62(13):3868-75
Low folic acid levels, along with low levels of vitamins B(6) and
B(12), are a risk factor for cardiovascular disease, neural tube defects, colon and breast cancer. JAMA 2002 Jun 19;287(23):3127-9
Dietary supplementation with soy protein reduced metastasis of breast
cancer cells from primary tumors to the lungs in mice. Clin Exp Metastasis 2002;19(6):535-40
Environmental Exposures:
Breast cancer patients had significantly higher levels of pesticides
in their bodies than healthy women, even after accounting for age, diet, and geographic distribution. Environ Int 2002
Nov;28(5):331-6
Certain pesticides induced (estrogen sensitive) cell proliferation
significantly. J Toxicol Environ Health A 2002 Oct 11;65(19):1419-35
PAH exposure (active or passive cigarette smoking, consumption of
grilled and smoked foods) may influence breast cancer development, although the association does not appear to be dose dependent
and may have a threshold effect.Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2002 Aug;11(8):677-85
Supplements:
"(T)here is increasing evidence that a variety of micronutrients
and hormones appear to have significant anticancer activity. These range from steroids such as dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA)
and its analysis to indoles, isothiocyanates, and isoflavone derivatives. These compounds act directly by interfering with
cyclins and promoting cancer cell death as well as indirectly by altering estrogen metabolism in a favorable direction. These
effects are not merely theoretical actions in cell culture and tissue explants; they have been demonstrated in human patients
as a range of studies have demonstrated." Ann N Y Acad Sci 2002 Jun;963:247-67
Experimental results indicate that dietary treatment with inulin
or oligofructose (i) reduced the incidence of mammary tumors, (ii) inhibited the growth of malignant tumors in mice; and (iii)
decreased the incidence of lung metastases. The treatment also made lower doses of chemotherapy more effective. Br J Nutr
2002 May;87 Suppl 2:S283-6
Black cohash, which is helpful in decreasing menopausal symptoms but is
non-estrogenic, also contains antioxidants that block cancer cell development. J Agric Food Chem 2002 Nov 20;50(24):7022-8
