Think outside the box; Integrative Oncology

When we hear the name cancer, automatically we think of surgery, chemo therapy, radiation, loosing quality of life, and pain. But really there is no other way to treat cancer?
Cancer treatment should be based on extensive genetic and metabolic testing and treatment as well as evaluating and treating Immune system for each patient. In the US, 42 prominent academic medical institutions including Cedars-Sinai, Harvard, Yale, Duke, and the Mayo clinic, are embracing integrative medicine modalities. Doctors are usually trained in the "silos" of specialized knowledge, but, increasingly they are learning to treat the whole person, look at every aspect of the patient's life, prevent disease, and become creative well rounded healers, And that's a pretty radical idea.

Every year, about 40 million Americans try alternative medicine. In cancer, generally patients seek complimentary treatments when it is in advanced stages. What usually prevents them to consider non conventional care at the beginning is the fact that they do not realize the importance of combining such therapies with their prescribed conventional treatment and simply think that what insurance companies pay for should suffice.

Unfortunately, the conventional treatments work when the cancer is "naive" to therapy. After a while cancer cells develop resistance. Surgery also can increase the development of vessles around the residual tumor cells by increasing VEGF (a signaling molecule for producing vessles) to nourish the cancer cells. So the end result is that patients are under the impression that "killing" the cancer will get rid of it, when as much you kill the cells, you still carry the stem cells, that are in charge of producing new cells.

There lots to say, but I want share a website with you created by a stage 3 cancer patient, she shared her experience trying Integrative oncology and refusing conventional therapy. Her website is "choose2beatcancer".

Let me know what you think?!