Introduction by Dr Abe Abrahami, Peach Rejuvenation Clinic

In modern society, cancer is the disease most feared by the majority of people throughout the world, surpassing the “white death” or tuberculosis during the last century, and the “black death” or bubonic plague of the Middle Ages.

In the mid-1980s nearly 6 million new cancer cases and more than 4 million deaths from cancer were being reported world-wide each year. The most common fatal form was stomach cancer (prevalent in Asia), but lung cancer has risen rapidly, because of the spread of cigarette smoking and pollution, to become the leading fatal cancer in the world today. Also, on the increase is the third-greatest killer, breast cancer. The fourth on the list is colon or rectum cancer.

Prostate cancer in men has been dramatically increased in the last decade. In the USA[1], every man over 50 is supposed to have a yearly check up. If a tumour is found, it is automatically removed, but so far, there is no evidence that it makes men live longer[2]. Prostate cancer presently accounts for 14,000 new cases every year in Britain, and is the third most common form of cancer in men in British men[3]. It is the most frequently occurring form of cancer among American men; 165,000 new cases of prostate cancer were diagnosed in the USA in 1993[4], and the numbers are growing. Prostate cancer is more common among men of Afro-Caribbean origin. On average, American men lose 9 years of their lives as a result of prostate cancer[5].

In the United States in the mid-1980s, more than one-fifth of all deaths were caused by cancer; only the cardiovascular diseases accounted for a higher percentage. In 1990, the American Cancer Society predicted that about 30 percent of Americans will eventually develop some form of the disease. In the United States skin cancer is the most prevalent cancer in both men and women. Lung cancer, however, causes the most deaths in both men and women. LEUKEMIA, or cancer of the blood, is the most common type seen in children. An increasing incidence of cancer has been observed over the past few decades, due in part, to improved cancer screening programs, to the increasing number of older persons in the population, and also to greater pollution and the large number of tobacco smokers, particularly among women.

The U.S. government and private organisations spent about $1.2 billion annually for cancer research in the early 1980s, and more than $20 billion annually on the care and treatment of cancer patients.

Due to the improvements in the diagnosis of cancer, surgery techniques and drugs, the number of deaths among cancer patients under 30 years of age has decreased. However, the number of deaths from cancer is increasing in the population as a whole. This is a worrying trend which prompted the growing popularity of Naturopathic Medicine, especially as the devastating side effects of radiotherapy and chemotherapy contribute to the suffering of patients whilst failing to increase the cure rate and address the root causes of cancer.

Causes of Cancer

General

A cancer-causing agent - chemical, biological, or physical - is termed a carcinogen. Substances are labelled carcinogens if, when administered to a population of previously untreated organisms, they cause a statistically significant increase in the incidence of neoplasm[6] compared with the incidence in subjects that are left untreated.

Chemical Agents

Chemicals that cause cancer have a variety of molecular structures and include complex hydrocarbons, aromatic amines, and certain metals, drugs, hormones, and naturally occurring

chemicals in moulds and plants. Many nitrosamines - simple organic oxides of nitrogen - are carcinogenic and may be produced within the human body. Hydrocarbons and nitrosamines are components of cigarette smoke and may be the carcinogenic agents; contributing to lung cancer in smokers. Certain aromatic amines, especially 2-naphthylamine, were originally used in the dye industry for dyeing cloth and other materials. After it became apparent that this chemical caused a high incidence of bladder cancer in workers, it was no longer used industrially. Another industrial chemical gas; VINYL chloride, has been implicated as the causative agent of sarcoma of blood vessels in the livers of exposed workers.

Several drugs, including certain alkylating agents used to treat cancer, are also carcinogenic; although these chemicals are used to break DNA strands of cancer cells, thereby killing the cells, this same property causes the agent to induce cancer in normal cells. High levels of oestrogen - a group of female hormones - administered to women after menopause result in an increased incidence of cancer of the uterus. To counteract this problem, today menopausal women are given oestrogen in combination with progesterone. Aflatoxin B, a complex molecule produced by strains of the mould ASPERGILLUS, causes various cancers, particularly liver cancer. Certain salts containing arsenic are probably causally related to cancer of the skin and liver.

The fact that such a variety of apparently unrelated chemical structures can induce cancer by a common mechanism was indicated by the research work in the 1960s of James and Elizabeth Miller. They demonstrated that chemical carcinogens, in order to exert their carcinogenic effect, must first be metabolised to an active, or “ultimate” form capable of reacting directly with cellular macromolecules, especially DNA. This and other research has strongly suggested that the formation of a cancer from a normal cell results from a chemical or structural alteration in the DNA of that cell.

Biological Agents

Various forms of parasites have been associated with many animal and plant cancers. Since humans are an integral part of nature’s food chain, it makes a logical sense that we are linked to these parasites, and can be infected by some of them. Although the actual linking mechanisms remain a subject of debate, the research and book of Dr Hulda Regehr Clark[7] suggests this is the case. Says Dr Clark: “… you will see that all forms of cancer are alike. A single parasite! It is the human intestine fluke. And if you kill this parasite, the cancer stops immediately. The tissue becomes normal again. In order to get cancer, you must have this parasite. If it establishes itself in the liver, it causes cancer.”

For example, the blood flukes that cause SCHISTOSOMIASIS (Bilharzia) frequently seem, further, to cause bladder and rectum cancer, a cancer particularly prevalent in Egypt. This parasitic worm infests the vein and lymph spaces, the worm eggs are the main cause of bleeding symptoms. The other biological agents, possibly linked with cancer more clearly, are the oncogenic (cancer-causing) viruses that commonly induce the formation of neoplasms in lower animals. Some of these viruses are now strongly linked with some human cancers, and at least one has definitely been proven to cause a form of leukaemia.

Among the viruses strongly linked with human cancers are a number of PAPILLOMA viruses and a HERPES virus, called the Epstein-Barr virus, that causes the disease known as infectious mononucleosis. This latter virus is also suspected of causing the malignancy called Burkitt’s lymphoma, prevalent in Africa, and a cancer of the nose and throat that commonly occurs in China. Another human cancer related to a virus infection is a liver carcinoma that sometimes follows a HEPATITIS-B infection. Another link established between a human cancer and a virus is that between T-cell leukaemia and a form of RETROVIRUS called HTLV-l; the cancer appears to be endemic in certain parts of Japan, the West Indies, and the south-eastern United States.

Cancer-causing viruses can be divided into DNA and RNA viruses depending on their structure. The DNA viruses mainly insert their genetic information directly into the cells of their hosts although the Epstein-Barr virus appears to exist in multiple copies as a nucleic material known as a PLASMID in the host cell’s nucleus, separate from the host DNA. The RNA viruses such as the HTLV-l virus, on the other hand, require first that their genetic information be transcribed into DNA by an enzyme, called reverse transcriptase, supplied by the virus.

All forms of oncogenic viruses contain one or more genes that are essential for the transformation of the infected cell into a neoplastic cell. Such genes, termed oncogenes, are best characterised in the structure of oncogenic RNA viruses. It is now apparent that such oncogenes have closely related counterparts in the normal cellular structure of the cells they infect. The viral form of the oncogene, however, has a different structure and appears to be activated and expressed abnormally by one mechanism or another, leading to neoplastic transformation of the cell. Some oncogenic viruses may activate the normal cellular counterparts of oncogenes, called c-oncogenes, by one of several mechanisms, thus causing the neoplastic transformation to occur. Possibly similar mechanisms may result from the action of chemicals or radiation, or both, resulting in the activation of c-oncogenes.

Physical Agents

Ultraviolet and high-energy radiation are also causative factors in human and animal cancer. A correlation exists between exposure to the sun’s ultraviolet rays and the occurrence of skin cancer in humans. Cancers caused by radiation include leukaemia as well as cancer of the thyroid, breast, stomach, uterus, and bone. Thus, such routine diagnostic tools as the X ray are used with care so that a person is not overexposed; physicians also caution people using sunlamps, which employ ultraviolet rays, to take precaution against excessive exposure.

Physically induced sarcomas can be produced when plastic or other films or disks are inserted under the skin, as demonstrated in experimental animals. After the implant has remained within the animal for nearly half its life, sarcomas usually develop around the implant. If the implant is pulverised or its structure markedly altered before insertion under the skin, no neoplasms develop. The implant's physical structure rather than the chemical composition, of the implant is, therefore, the cause of the cancer.

A similar circumstance occurs with ASBESTOS, an inorganic crystal that irritates the mesothelial lining of the lungs, inducing mesotheliomas in people and animals. A definite crystalline structure of this inorganic compound is required for its carcinogenic properties, and destruction of this crystalline form results in no tumour formation.

Inherited Cancer

While it is unclear why cancer develops in some individuals and not in others, heredity appears to play a role in certain cancers. For this reason, the family history - a record of diseases and the cause and age of death of family members - may be important in predicting and diagnosing cancer. Some hereditary cancers include familial polyposis of the colon, which comprises small benign tumours of the large intestine that invariably develop into colon cancer; retinoblastoma, which is a tumour of the retina occurring in children; and a type of breast cancer that arises before the age of 40. While these types of cancers exhibit a dominant mode of inheritance at the cellular level, they are recessive, requiring the alteration of both copies of the affected gene in order for a cell to become malignant. This means that the affected gene acts to suppress the neoplastic phenotype[8], since those cells with at least one normal copy of the critical gene do not express neoplastic properties. In contrast, activation of c-oncogenes acts in a truly dominant manner at the cellular level to cause the neoplastic phenotype.

Recessive disorders include xeroderma pigmentosum, a severely disfiguring skin disorder that results from abnormalities in the organism’s ability to repair damage to DNA and is invariably associated with several different types of human cancer, including skin cancer. Ataxia telangiectasia is another recessive disorder, characterised by nervous-system disorders and abnormal dilation of small blood vessels; Hodgkin's disease, leukaemia, and certain cancers of the brain are among the neoplasms associated with this disease. Other forms of cancers, such as chronic myelogenous leukaemia, are associated with specific structural abnormalities in the chromosomes of the neoplastic cells. Certain chromosomal structural abnormalities characteristically - seen in specific leukaemia and other malignant neoplasms -have been related to the activation of c-oncogenes in those neoplastic cells exhibiting such structural abnormalities.

Summary of Cancer Causes

In her book; Picture of Health[9], Helen Graham writes as follows: “ More serious disorders such as schizophrenia also arise [like neurosis] from a failure to make distinction between the self and the non-self. … [likewise] the cancer cell acts as though it were schizophrenic[10]. A normal cell will, in the process of growth, be impeded through contact with other cells; the separating membranes serving as a barrier against the intrusion of one cell into the other. Cells are thus normally permitted to grow, and simultaneously maintain integrity of form and function. The cancer cell however, fails to respect these boundaries and grows unimpeded by cellular contact inhibition[11], assisted through the collusion of adjoining cells in allowing their barrier membranes to yield to this intrusion. The cancer cells are not qualitatively different from normal cells initially. Normal cells, when young, divide but remain undifferentiated, just as cancer cells do, but at this point cancer cells begin to manifest their pathology. Instead of maturing into specialised cells with a specialised function, the cancer cell remains in a state of undifferentiation. It has thus become stuck in an immature phase.”

Once a cancer cell goes wild, it is very difficult to contain, remove, or reverse its status into a normal cell.

Naturopathic Cancer Therapies

Cognitive-Synergy Therapyä and meditation exercises described in the book COGNITIVE-SYNERGY YOUR POTENT HEALING POWER by Dr Abe Abrahami, particularly visualisation of cancer cells being destroyed by the good immunity cells, using physical picture or otherwise, can be most powerful.

Our mind has a powerful influence on our bodies, for good or bad.

Accessing negative emotions, releasing them, and reaping the positive benefits on the immune system, can be good according to integrative medicine experts.

This is the cardinal principle and benefit of Cognitive-Synergy Therapy and an increasingly important part of cancer therapy.

Mind-body interactions do not necessarily guarantee a cure but they can and do affect what happens in our bodies, according to the department of mind-body medicine at Cancer Therapy Centers of America's MidwesternRegionalMedicalCenter.

When a patient is faced with destructive therapy procedures, such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy, stress levels can rise and may aggravate some of the side effects of therapy, such as nausea, fatigue, and low energy.

Creating a sense of relaxed control over your situation and emotional state will be useful in combating cancer and other morbid illness.

Examples of mind-body medicine to fight cancer embrace deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, guided imagery, yoga, tai chi, Reiki, acupressure, deep-tissue massage, listening to relaxing music and enjoying nature.

Religion and belief in G-d and prayer can be likewise most powerful and beneficial.

At the Swedish Cancer Institute in Seattle, staff members, as well as cancer patients and their families, are encouraged to take advantage of mind-body therapies.

The Figure below outlines what happens in our mind and body so far as excessive stress response is concerned and the resultant types of illness.

The effective use of Cognitive-Synergy Therapy and its meditative techniques could be helpful and useful to reverse or minimise the negative side effects of stress and destructive therapies administered to morbid disease patients.

“Mind over matter” in the true and deep sense.

Phytochemicals:

According to Ohio State University Extension Fact Sheet, Family and Consumer Sciences, HYG-5050-98, Sereana Howard Dresbach, Amy Rossi, these food substances have cancer-fighting properties.

Phytochemicals are non-nutritive plant chemicals that contain protective, disease-preventing compounds. More than 900 different Phytochemicals have been identified as components of food, and many more continue to be discovered today.

It is estimated that there may be more than 100 different Phytochemicals in just one serving of vegetables.

As early as 1980, the National Cancer Institute Chemoprevention Program of the Division of Cancer Prevention and Control began evaluating Phytochemicals for safety, efficacy, and applicability for preventing and treating diseases.

Researchers have long known that there are Phytochemicals present in plants, but only recently that they are being recommended for protection against cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and hypertension.

Most Commonly Studied Phytochemicals indicate their presence in the following food:

· Allium vegetables - (garlic, onions, chives, leeks)

· Cruciferous vegetables - (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, kale, turnips, bok choy, kohlrabi)

· Solanaceous vegetables - (tomatoes, peppers)

· Umbelliferous vegetables - (carrots, celery, cilantro, parsley, parsnips)

· Compositae plants - (artichoke)

· Citrus fruits - (oranges, lemons, grapefruit)
Glucarates

· Other fruits (grapes, berries, cherries, apples, cantaloupe, watermelon, pomegranate)

· Beans, grains, seeds - (soybeans, oats, barley, brown rice, whole wheat, flax seed)
Protease inhibitors

· Herbs, spices (ginger, mint, rosemary, thyme, oregano, sage, basil, tumeric, caraway, fennel)

· Licorice root
Green tea
Polyphenols

Although Phytochemicals are not yet classified as nutrients, substances necessary for sustaining life, they have been identified as containing properties for aiding in disease prevention.

Specifically, the economic cost of cancer to society was estimated to be about $104 billion in 1997.

With health-care costs being a major issue today, it would be cost effective to continue the research needed to help promote the awareness and consumption of Phytochemicals as a prevention strategy for the public.

Soybeans:

A substance found in soybeans may reduce the risk of colon cancer, the third most common form of cancer in the world.

It claims that soy glycosylceramide has been found to be effective in reducing the formation and growth of tumour cells in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract in mice, according to research published in this month’s Journal of Nutrition.

”Soy is known to have a number of health benefits, including the suppression of cancer. Based on our results, some of this benefit may be due to a group of molecules known as sphingolipids,” - said Al Merrill, a researcher at Georgia Tech and leader of the research team, which also included scientists from Emory University and the Karmanos Cancer Institute in the US.

Merrill and his colleagues had already shown that milk sphingolipids can suppress tumour formation, but this study was the first to establish that the sphingolipids of plants - which are structurally different - can also inhibit colon cancer, the researcher claimed.

Nutrients to Defeat Cancer

According to Walter Last, the following supplements consisting of high quality foods and nutrients may be helpful with cancer:

Acidophilus and bifido cultures:

These are essential to restore a healthy intestinal flora, especially at the start of the program and after any antibiotics and chemotherapy.

If you cannot use homemade yogurt, take powdered cultures sold in refrigerated brown glass bottles or high-potency capsules. Keep them refrigerated.

Alpha-lipoic acid (ALA):

This is a strong antioxidant and helpful to improve immune functions and overcome viral infections, especially hepatitis and AIDS, may be taken in conjunction with vitamin C.

Bee-pollen, Bee-propolis, spirulina and ground linseed:

These nutrients are highly recommended as part of an anti-cancer diet, due to their cleansing and strengthening qualities and properties.

Beetroot (fresh or cooked but not tinned)

This humble vegetable is useful for headache, coughs, cold, to improve one’s sex life, and boost the body’s immune system, as it is rich in many important minerals and micronutrients.

Ginger:

This is an excellent anti-inflammatory remedy and also stimulates digestion and helps to prevent nausea. Use fresh ginger in your vegetable juices.

Ginseng and Coenzyme Q10:

These help to stimulate the metabolism and increase energy levels. Good-quality Q10 supposedly has a deep orange color, while less potent varieties are paler and yellow.

Grape Seed Extract

This containsProanthocyanidins - a group of antioxidants that chemically belong to the class of bioflavonoids. They strengthen connective tissue and reduce or prevent inflammation that surrounds invasive tumors. Commercially it is extracted from maritime pine bark and grape seeds.

Inositol:

This is a vitamin-like substance. On its own or combined with phytic acid (inositol-hexaphosphate) it has been used to slow the growth of cancer cells and blood vessels in tumors, it also seems to initiate a suicide mechanism in cancer cells.

Kelp:

This supplies essential minerals and especially iodine required to produce thyroid hormones from the amino acid tyrosine. Many cancer sufferers have an under-active thyroid.

Lactoferrin:

It is derived from colostrums[12], stimulates the immune system. Also propolis (see above) is highly recommended as a natural antibiotic. Best suck tablets between meals or chew and keep in the mouth for some time.

Lecithin:

It supplies essential nutrients and helps to absorb lipids and cleanse the liver. Mix half or one teaspoon of lecithin granules with meals; you may also add some to fresh juices to improve the absorption of carotenes and flavonoids. Instead of granules you may take lecithin capsules.

Maca:

This is a Peruvian root powder, assists in normalizing our endocrine glands or hormonal systems. It is especially effective for improving thyroid function and balancing sex hormones. It may also noticeably improve energy levels.

Microhydrin:

This is a strong antioxidant containing negative hydrogen. You may use it to improve the quality of drinking water by adding a capsule to a glass of pure water several times a day.

Amino Acids:

Sulfur amino acids taurine, L-cysteine and L-methionine assist detoxification and oxygen metabolism. Alternatively, or in addition, use plenty of sulfur-rich foods, such as onions and vegetables of the cabbage family, especially broccoli and red cabbage.

DLPA or DL Phenylalaninemay be used for persistent pain, and when the pain eases, reduce the intake.

L-glutamine is another amino acid, assists if one is underweight and weak, and cannot gain any weight.

With lack of energy try L-carnitine. It is required to produce energy from fatty acids and can be deficient with vegetarian diets, or liver problems, or if elderly, and especially in vegetarians with type O blood group.

The essential amino acid L-lysine is an important component of collagen but in addition it also inhibits the proteolytic enzymes that allow the cancer to spread.

Anti-Angiogenesis and Enzyme Inhibition:

Tumors can only grow by developing new blood vessels. This process is called angiogenesis. To grow, tumors also need to dissolve the surrounding connective tissue or collagen with the help of special enzymes.

This same enzyme activity may also allow the formation of metastases. Blocking these two processes, angiogenesis and enzymatic invasion of surrounding tissue, goes a long way to overcome the cancer. (These should NOT be confused with digestive enzymes)

Glucosamine and chondroitin:

Commonly used as sulfates, are important basic building blocks in the formation of cartilage and other connective tissue. They strengthen the connective tissue around a tumor to make it less invasive and also have anti-inflammatory properties.

These sulfates are also beneficial for arthritic conditions.

Other remedies that inhibit the formation of new blood vessels and the spread of cancer are zinc, vitamin B2, green tea, turmeric and alkalizing the body.

Digestive Enzymes:

Supplementation with digestive enzymes is highly recommended, especially in difficult or advanced conditions. Protein-digesting enzymes or proteases, preferably in addition to lipase, the fat-digesting enzyme, not only digest food, but also tumors.

If the digestion is weak, in advanced conditions, and with any cooked meals, use digestive enzymes during each meal. However, as a tumor-destroying agent, digestive enzymes should be taken in high doses well before meals and at bedtime. Best use a combination of pancreatin, bromelain, papain, as well as fungal proteases.

Summary

· The naturopathic means described herein are not medicines to cure cancer, but natural food supplements and adjunct methods to help awaken in the body its autoimmune defences to fight and defeat cancer.

· Only a qualified Nutritional-Medical-Homeopathic practitioner or Naturopath can offer you suitable advice or course of therapy.

· Mind over matter meditative techniques have been useful alongside complementary and/or conventional medical therapy.

· C-S (Cognitive-Synergy) Therapy and mind over matter techniques do not replace medical attention.

DISCLAIMER:

This article is for educational purposes only and any person following the material herein, is totally responsible for his/her own health. This material does not substitute medical diagnosis/treatment by a qualified physician.The Author cannot guarantee full/accurate information.

[1] What Doctors Don’t Tell You (a British publication), July 1995

[2] JAMA, Sept. 14, 1994

[3] The Lancet, May 22, 1993

[4] JAMA, May 26, 1993

[5] National Cancer Institute, 1989, No. 89-2789

[6] A tumour; an abnormal local multiplication of some type of cell. A neoplasm may be either benign; if it shows no tendency to spread, or malignant; if the growing cells infiltrate surrounding tissues and spread in to other parts of the body.

[7] The Cure for All Cancers, Promotion Publishing

[8] Property shown by an individual, due to the expression of characters of his genotype (human inherited characteristics).

[9] Judy Piatkus (Publishers) Ltd, London

[10] Goldberg, 1983, page 23

[11] Lowenstein, 1966

[12] Bovine colostrums are the "early" milk produced by cows during the first several days post-parturition. This “pre- milk” liquid has a nutrient profile and immunological composition that differs substantially from "mature" milk. Included in the nutrient profile are higher amounts of immunoglobulins, growth factors, cytokines, and nucleosides than are found in milk. Bovine colostrums are also rich in oligosaccharides, antimicrobials, and immune-regulating factors. Available evidence suggests a beneficial effect of supplementation of bovine colostrums in improving body composition, aspects of athletic performance, diarrhea in persons with immune-deficiency syndromes, NSAID-induced gastrointestinal disturbances, and aspects of the acute phase response that occurs secondary to surgery. Specific hyperimmune bovine colostrums, produced to have high neutralizing titer activity against measles, rotavirus, and infectious disease.