Saturday Quack – Cancer “Cures”

There is nothing more frustrating than having a friend or relative who has been diagnosed with cancer resorting to unproven cancer ‘cures’. The reasons are many – often a poor experience with chemotherapy or radiation therapy, sometimes religious conviction, or even a willingness to try anything that might work, as a true ‘last resort’. All these reasons are understandable, but they are often fed by the promotional efforts of totally spurious treatments. And the Internet is loaded with such schemes.

Often, cancer cure treatments are harmless – except to the patient’s pocket; for example, Dr Budwig’s Flax Oil-Protein Diet. In spite of many year’s use, and thousands of testimonials, there is not a single well-conducted clinical trial providing evidence of the diet’s effectiveness in helping treat cancer.

There are other, more potent so-called curative treatments. These are supposed to be reserved for people who have failed to improve with ‘orthodox’ medicine. They include such therapy as intravenous vitamin C, intravenous ozone and hydrogen peroxide. They may often produce unpleasant or lethal side effects, and again, there is no evidence of their effectiveness.

For patients who believe they have nothing to lose, there may be the option of enrolling in a clinical trial of a new drug being studied for safety and effectiveness in treating cancer. The treatment they will receive will certainly have shown promise in animal and cell-culture models, and therefore may help the patient. An important part of such participation, however, is the knowledge that one is helping in the development of a potential new medication, using a method which will provide results that contribute to the body of evidence about the candidate drug. That’s infinitely preferable to taking a much used remedy for which there’s been no evidence accumulated over many years.