Tag Archives: Fighting Cancer

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Immuno-Oncology

Alternative Therapies Help Relieve Cancer Symptoms, Promote Healing

Artistic Therapy
Artistic Therapy

Cancer is a disease of the physical body, but it permeates every aspect of life, coloring the way we think and feel and even how we relate to ourselves and others. Many cancer patients are so overwhelmed by the burden of cancer that they feel as if they have lost control not only of their health and body but of life itself.

Conventional cancer treatments that focus on treating the body fail to address the emotional, psychological and what some might call the spiritual forces that can have an even greater impact than physical health on an individual’s ability to fight and survive cancer. Alternative cancer treatment centers like Issels Integrative Oncology recognize the power of the mind-body connection to promote healing.

Issels cancer treatment teams take a holistic approach to cancer treatment that nurtures the complete individual. We employ advanced science-based treatment protocols to address the physical aspects of cancer while building up the individual’s immune system and nurturing each patient’s emotional health. We want our patients to leave us with a renewed sense of well-being and hope so they can focus on healing.

Employing the creative arts to aid cancer patients in expressing their emotions and conquering their fear of cancer is one of the alternative cancer therapies that are finding success in helping cancer patients strengthen the mind-body connection that promotes wellness. The use of art, dance, drama, music and writing therapy has been remarkably successful in helping cancer patients manage the stress of treatment, achieve a more positive attitude about cancer outcomes, achieve a higher state of wellness that promotes recovery and increase post-cancer life expectancy.

More next time

Immunotherapy

Immunotherapy Called ‘Paradigm Shift’ in Cancer Treatment

Immune System Boosters
Immune System Boosters

Big Pharma is jumping on the immunotherapy band wagon. According to Bloomberg.com, major drug companies are poised to introduce a new generation of experimental cancer drugs that use the immune system to target and destroy tumor cells. Big Pharma may be putting a new twist on immunotherapy, but the treatment philosophy is hardly new. Alternative cancer treatment centers were early to recognize the importance the human immune system plays in fighting cancer. Immune-boosting cancer vaccines and integrative immunotherapy have been cornerstones of Issels Integrative Oncology treatment protocols for 60 years.

Motivated by billions of dollars in potential drug sales, drug companies are waiting for study results scheduled for presentation at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology at the end of May before launching new drugs.

[Immunotherapy] “is going to be a paradigm shift for treating cancer. We are pretty good at shrinking tumors but not good at getting rid of them. Immune therapy is a way to begin to approach that,” Merck VP Gary Gilliland told Bloomberg.

Drug makers estimate it will take a year to determine the effectiveness of new immunotherapy drugs to increase cancer survival rates and extend lives. Bloomberg notes “the strategy offers scientists the first major new avenue for attacking cancer in a decade.”

Rather than waiting for Big Pharma to complete its testing, we’d like to recommend that people with cancer review the patient testimonials on our website. We’ve been using immunotherapy to fight cancer for more than 60 years and many of our patients have enjoyed complete long-term cancer remissions. Visit our website to hear what they have to say.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Survivors

Book Profiles Doctors Using Alternative Cancer Treatments to ‘Knockout’ Cancer

Alternative Healing
Alternative Healing

Better known today for her fitness videos and self-help books on diet and nutrition, Suzanne Somers rose to fame as ditzy blonde bombshell Chrissy on the 1977 hit sitcom Three’s Company. A frightening brush with breast cancer in 2001 changed Suzanne’s life.

After a lumpectomy to remove the tumor, her poor experience with radiation treatment led her to choose alternative cancer treatments over chemotherapy. Ten years after her successful recovery, Suzanne wrote Knockout: Interviews with Doctors Who Are Curing Cancer — and How to Prevent Getting It in the First Place (available on Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle).

Using her personal journey with breast cancer and her own experiences with alternative cancer treatments and alternative methods of cancer prevention as a springboard, in Knockout Suzanne puts the spotlight on innovative alternative cancer treatments and preventative measures that focus on building up the body and immune system.

In interviews with doctors who are successfully using alternative medical methods that are not yet part of Western medicine’s mainstream to knockout cancer, Suzanne explores the cutting-edge science and forward-reaching medical theories that are driving innovation in cancer treatment.

Among the alternative cancer treatments reviewed in Knockout are many of those  developed and employed at Issels Cancer Treatment Centers in Santa Barbara, California and Tijuana, Mexico, including modern integrative oncology, immunotherapy, cell therapy, cancer vaccines and gene-based therapies. In fact, Suzanne notes the role of our founder, Dr. Josef Issels, in pioneering integrative immunotherapy in the fight against cancer.

In Knockout, Suzanne says, “Cancer kills and continues to kill. But there is hope, and this book offers new choices.”  Issels Integrative Oncology is one of those new choices.

 

Alternative Cancer Treatment, News

Why Do Some People Get Cancer and Others Don’t?

Developing Cancer
Developing Cancer

Men have a 1 in 2 chance of developing some sort of cancer at sometime during their lifetime and a 1 in 4 chance of dying from cancer. For women, the risk of developing cancer is 1 in 3 and the risk of dying from cancer is 1 in 5, according to the U.S. National Cancer Institute database.

Many factors, particularly age, sex and genetic inheritance, affect both your lifetime cancer risk and your risk of developing a specific type of cancer. But despite the risk, there are some people who do not get cancer even when a family history of cancer exists.

Why do some people get cancer while others don’t? That’s the new focus of an ongoing American Cancer Society study that was begun in 1950 and is now in its third generation. Three hundred thousand people between the ages of 30 and 65 are being enrolled in the latest phase of the study. Participants must be cancer-free when they join the study. After providing an initial blood sample and completing a comprehensive health survey, participants are sent follow-up surveys every two years.

The first generation study discovered the link between smoking and lung cancer. The second generation study begun in the 1980s linked obesity with increased cancer risk. The current study is exploring the effects of a sedentary lifestyle on cancer risk as well as the question of why some people get cancer while others do not.

The answer to that question may take decades to unravel. If you get cancer, Issels Integrative immunotherapy alternative cancer treatments and cancer vaccines may tip the survival odds in your favor.

After Cancer, Cancer Survivors

More Suggestions for Creating a Cancer Survivor Manual

Daily Exercise
Daily Exercise

Cancer survivors that work with their cancer treatment team to create a plan for maintaining good health after cancer are most likely to thrive (see our previous post). Working with your Issels Integrative Oncology team to create a long-range lifestyle plan that addresses your physical, mental and nutritional health may both help your enjoy life to its fullest and prevent cancer recurrence.

Today we continue our suggestions for creating a cancer survivor’s manual:

  1. The basic tenets of living a healthy lifestyle should form the core of a cancer survival plan. Discuss an appropriate exercise plan with your doctor and exercise regularly. Start slow, increasing exercise every 2 to 3 weeks as your strength returns. A good goal for most people is 20 minutes of cardio exercise (walking, swimming, etc.) and 30 minutes of resistance training 3 to 5 days a week.
  2. With your medical team, develop a nutrition plan based on an anti-inflammatory diet that boosts your immune system. Many cancer survivor diet plans follow a basic Mediterranean diet which features plenty of antioxidant-rich fresh fruits and vegetables, fish high in omega-3s, nuts, beans, whole grains, lean meat and healthy oils. Maintaining a healthy diet can also help you lose weight, further decreasing your risk of cancer return.
  3. Add stress-reduction activities to your daily routine. Learn relaxation techniques such as mindful meditation or progressive muscle relaxation to help keep stress under control. Many cancer survivors find the support and encouragement they need in cancer support groups. Some cancer centers offer after-care programs for cancer survivors to help monitor health and help cancer survivors stay on track.
Alternative Cancer Treatment

Holistic Techniques for Managing Cancer Pain

While revelations gained from brain imagery offer future hope for more effective pain management techniques for people who suffer from chronic pain, including cancer patients (see our previous post), taking a holistic approach to pain management currently offers the most successful pain relief.

Holistic medicine is actually a medical philosophy rather than a type of medicine. The holistic approach considers 5 important factors that affect an individual’s overall health and well-being:

  1. Physical
  2. Mental
  3. Emotional
  4. Spiritual
  5. Environment

Scientific research is beginning to prove what Issels patients and Issels cancer treatment teams know to be true from experiential evidence: that a holistic approach seeking to engage every aspect of a patient’s condition can produce amazing results, even when hope of recovery was considered slim.

Holistic techniques that have been successful in alleviating and managing cancer pain include:

  • Exercise. An essential component of pain management, exercise, even in its mildest forms, can help alleviate pain. Exercise helps to rid the body of hormones that exacerbate stress which can cause pain to flare. Exercise also helps keep muscles toned, limber and flexible which can also help to reduce physical pain.
  • Mind-body exercises. Techniques and exercises that help forge mind-body connections, such as yoga, therapeutic massage, meditation, biofeedback and acupuncture, have proven remarkably successful in helping cancer patients control pain.
  • Nutrition. Certain foods have been discovered to have pain-fighting qualities, including fruits such as red grapes and cherries, herbs and spices such as ginger and turmeric, fish, soy products and even coffee!