All posts by heavy

Cancer Research, News

U.S. Lung Cancer Rates Start to Decline

Lung Cancer On The Decline
Lung Cancer On The Decline

Major research on lung cancer has determined some significant, positive trends: overall rates have dropped about 12 percent over the last thirty years according to Denise Riedel Lewis of the U.S. National Cancer Institute. Some types of lung cancer are stagnant or even increasing, however.

Smoking causes at least 90 percent of lung cancer cases, so declining usage of tobacco products directly accounts for decreasing rates overall. Scientists believe that smoking habits also contribute to increasing rates for certain cancer types.

Adenocarcinoma and “Light” Cigarettes

People who smoke “light” cigarettes may believe that lower nicotine levels offer a health benefit, but this new data points to rising lung cancer rates for these smokers.

Dr. Norman Edelman of the American Lung Association points out that carcinogens reach the outer areas of lungs more often when people deeply inhale low-nicotine cigarettes rather than taking shallower inhalations of standard cigarettes.

Rates are increasing for adenocarcinoma, or lung cancer that begins in the outer lungs. Women, who smoke “light” cigarettes at higher rates than men, have had notably high rates of adenocarcinoma in recent years.

Some Lung Cancer Rates Hitting a Plateau

According to Edelman, men’s lung cancer rates have been falling for years while women’s rates have held steady. Women starting to smoke later in life than men contributed to lower rates among women in the past, with rates now evening out between the sexes.

The NCI study looked at lung cancer cases from 1977 to 2010, covering significant changes in smoking rates as well as advances in lung cancer treatments.

To learn more about innovations in lung cancer treatments, contact Issels Integrative Oncology Centers.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research

Venoms May Be Used to Fight Cancer

Could Venom Be The Answer
Could Venom Be The Answer

Scientists are optimistic about attacking cancer cells with the poisonous venoms most of us desperately try to avoid. Dr. Dipanjan Pan led a team at the University of Illinois that has successfully and safely targeted breast cancer and melanoma cells in a lab.

While being able to kill cancer cells and prevent them from multiplying is good news by itself, another important breakthrough is Dr Pan’s success at concentrating the focus of scorpion, snake, and bee venom on the cancer cells without destroying healthy cells and ultimately harming the patient.

Dr. Pan and his team were able to “camouflage” the venom in a tiny particle. This takes the venom directly to the targeted cancer cells without allowing it to leak into the bloodstream of patients and damage the heart, nerve cells, or other healthy tissue.

The researchers discovered that venom from snakes, scorpions, and bees contain peptides and proteins that will attach to cancer cell walls. They also verified that bee venom contains a substance called melittin that prevents cancer cells from spreading. Bees produce such a small amount of venom that extracting a sufficient amount of the substance from them for laboratory testing or clinical use is impractical. The team developed a way to synthesize the melittin.

Dr. Pan stressed that, while the venom from snakes and scorpions can be deadly, his team is able to control the potency and utilize them as a possible cancer treatment. The positive results from cloaking these venoms in nanoparticles could lead to human trials in then next three to five years.

For more than 60 years, Issels Integrative Oncology has been providing safe and successful immunotherapy.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research

How Is Systemic Hyperthermia Used for Cancer Treatment?

What Is Hyperthermia?
What Is Hyperthermia?

Heat is one of the natural tools your body uses to fight disease. The fever generated by bacterial infections, flu and other viruses indicate not only that your body’s immune system is under attack but that it is fighting back. Raising your body’s internal temperature is like taking a flame-thrower to the attacking disease. Uncontrolled fever can, of course, have serious consequences for the patient. But carefully administered and controlled heating of the body – called systemic hyperthermia — can produce therapeutic benefits in the treatment of cancer tumors.

What Is Hyperthermia?

Issels extensive experience using systemic hyperthermia as part of our integrative immunotherapy program for cancer treatment is now being replicated at university hospital centers in the United States and Europe. Also called Thermal Therapy, systemic hyperthermia is the deliberate heating of the whole body for the therapeutic treatment of disease. Over our 60 years of experience using thermal therapy to treat cancer, Issels has found that thermal therapy can also be applied to affected parts of the body with similar benefit.

How Does Hyperthermia Fight Cancer?

Used in cancer treatment, the deliberate heating of the body promotes a beneficial general stimulation of the body’s innate immune system. But thermal therapy also triggers immune system responses that specifically target cancer tumors, allowing the body to vigorously and effectively attack cancer tumors. Research has shown that systemic hyperthermia has a positive effect on cancer-fighting immune system components, including accelerated maturation of dendritic cells, activation of T-cells, increased production of T-lymphocytes and accelerated production of Natural Killer Cells.

Visit our website to find out more about alternative cancer treatments that offer cancer patients quality of life benefits.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research, Cancer Survivors, Immunotherapy, Living with Cancer

Can Your Body Be Trained to Cure Its Own Cancer?

Can You Train To Fight Cancer?
Can You Train To Fight Cancer?

For decades, cancer patients have been limited to a trio of treatment options. While surgery, chemotherapy and radiation have their effectiveness, they also have serious drawbacks that can compromise quality of life. Continued research in the area of immunotherapy is uncovering its power to fight cancer naturally while preserving the body’s healthy cells.

The exciting concept behind immunotherapy is that uses the power of the body’s own immune system to essentially treat itself. Unlike chemotherapy, the immune system is more adaptive and able to distinguish between healthy tissue and invaders such as cancer cells. Consider the example of childhood vaccines, which remain effective over time thanks to the immune system’s memory.

One of the biggest breakthroughs came in a 2013 study conducted by Bristol-Myers Squibb. A group of 52 melanoma patients was treated with one approved and one experimental drug. Nearly one-third experienced rapid and deep tumor regression. As study leader Dr. Jedd Wolchok observed, “We have spent several decades in cancer research learning better ways to treat the tumor. Now we are learning how to treat the patient.”

Dr. David Maloney has been working on targeted cancer therapies since he was a student at Stanford in the early 1980s. He’s currently focused on a procedure wherein a patient is infused with his own T-cells that have been harvested and genetically re-engineered to become better cancer “drones”. He cites the benefit of immunotherapy as a move away from a “one-size-fits-all” approach to customized treatments.

For more than 60 years, Issels has been on the forefront of integrative immuno-oncology treatments. Visit our website to read and hear first-hand testimonials from our patients.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research, Immunotherapy, Living with Cancer

Cancer Has Been Linked to Popular Menopause Medication

Cancer Linked To Menopause Medication
Cancer Linked To Menopause Medication

Two new studies appear to have decided the debate over whether there is a causal link between cancer and menopause hormone therapy. The answer is YES.

Menopause Drug Linked to Cancer

In recent cancer news, a Canadian Cancer Society report concludes that a popular estrogen-based menopause drug has caused breast cancer in thousands of Canadian women.

As reported in The Star, the report states: “The body of evidence to date overwhelmingly points to a causal connection between the use of Premplus and the development of invasive breast cancer in women.”

The report has sparked a Canadian class-action lawsuit against the drug’s manufacturer, Wyeth Canada. Owned by U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, Wyeth has denied that Premplus causes breast cancer, stating that the medication is “safe and effective when used as directed.” A Vancouver court will hear the lawsuit in October.

HRT Doubles Cancer Risk

In corroborating cancer news, a large federal study in the U.S. has found that menopause hormone replacement therapy (HRT) medications double breast cancer risk when taken for five years. In women taking estrogen and progestin pills, cancer risk increased in just two years.

However, halting hormone replacement therapy returned cancer risk levels to normal in about two years. Given study findings, researchers believe breast cancer risk would not increase for most women if hormone replacement therapy was stopped within three years.

“It’s an excellent message for women: You can still diminish risk (by quitting), even if you’ve been on hormones for a long time,” Dr. Claudine Isaacs of Georgetown University told The Star.

Issels integrative immunotherapy offers personalized non-toxic treatments for breast and other cancers. Contact us for information about integrative oncology.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research

Aspirin May Actually Cut Cancer Risk

Aspirin As A Cancer Reducer?
Aspirin As A Cancer Reducer?

Many doctors already recommend taking an aspirin a day to decrease the risk of stroke and heart attack, but recent cancer news indicates that swallowing an aspirin a day may also decrease certain types of cancer risk.

Cutting Cancer Risk

British researchers at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine in London have found strong evidence that people age 50 to 65 could cut their risk of contracting colon, esophageal and stomach cancers by taking one baby aspirin (75 to 81 milligrams) a day for 10 years.

“Taking aspirin daily looks to be the most important thing we can do to reduce cancer after stopping smoking and reducing obesity,” one British researcher told USA Today.

Beware of Side Effects

However, both study researchers and other cancer experts recommend talking to your doctor before beginning a preventative aspirin regimen. Aspirin can cause gastrointestinal bleeding and may cause other adverse and potentially dangerous side effects, particularly when taken with certain other drugs such as blood thinners.

Also of concern, a study reported by Newser.com found that long-term aspirin therapy “may be a factor in macular degeneration,” an age-related eye disease that can result in eventual blindness. Due to the increased risk of aspirin-related bleeding with age, British researchers generally recommended halting daily aspirin therapy after 10 years.

Benefits Outweigh Side Effects

“There was clear evidence that the benefits vastly outweigh the side effects,” study leader Dr. Jack Cuzick told the New York Times.

While cancer news shows support for use of long-term aspirin therapy to prevent cancer growing, questions remain. We recommend talking to your Issels cancer treatment team to see if aspirin therapy is right for you.