My Malignant Melanoma

I see someone has posted the old internet myth about asparagus and cancer on What Now. Perhaps someone at the asparagus marketing board is forwarding this tosh out in time for the fresh asparagus season.

The only reference anywhere in the world to the supposed original author "Richard R. Vensal, D.D.S" seems to be the version of the article which has been circulating the internet since 2006.

There is no other trace in the scientific literature of either the author, or the journal in which it was supposedly published (a now defunct collection of anecdotes on alternative medicine).

However, we can note that if there is a Richard Vensal, a DDS would make him a dentist, rather than a biochemist, a nutritionist or an oncologist.

As someone has pointed out on the board, "It is...a load of bullshit". Ah, le mot juste!

Ooh look, a timely nurse blog on this. Whatever next?

Labels: Alternative, asparagus, Cancer, Diet, evidence, Malignant, Medicine, Nature, promotion, quack, Richard Vensal, Trial

I see someone is promoting a dietary supplement called Biovitali Vitalcells on the What Now board with what looks to the unsophisticated eye like some reasonable scientific evidence. I guess the moderators will eventually get round to deleting this, but wouldn't it be better to have a look at how strong the evidence is?

So let's have a look at that evidence, which is:

1. The product has apparently been patented

2. It is supposedly endorsed by the MD Anderson Cancer Research Centre and the National Foundation for Cancer Research

3. Laboratory trials show it not just to stop cancer and cardiovascular illnesses in their tracks, but to prevent them occurring in the first place, and to extend life by 30%

Taking these claims one by one-

1. Patenting something does not mean that anyone has shown it to actually work. It is a commercial device to prevent anyone copying your work. Having a patent does not mean that something does what it claims. This is no evidence at all.

2. It seems not to be endorsed by either the MD Anderson Cancer Research Centre, or the National Foundation for Cancer Research as is claimed in the manufacturers literature. Both of the organisations in fact have advice against cancer patients and others taking non-prescribed food supplements on their websites, here and here. Neither of their websites make any mention of this product.

3. If the non-peer-reviewed in-house research on the manufacturer's website were true, and applicable to humans, cancer would be no more serious than the common cold. Every single one of the ingredients shows at least 80% tumour inhibition, and together they are even more powerful. But every one of these ingredients is a substance present in normal foodstuffs. How can this be?

Let's see what might be going on. Have a look at the table at the end on lifespan increase. 100% of these mice get cancer during their lives. That is because this strain of mouse has been specially bred to get skin cancer.

The experimenters made getting cancer a racing certainty in their antioxidant experiments by also injecting the mice with a powerful cancer-causing agent, and then constantly feeding them with something which helps cancer to grow.

They have not published their experimental protocol, but let us generously assume it was similar to that used in this real scientific research, despite us not being in a position to check whether they did things properly.

They fed the supplements along with the substance which helps cancer to grow, so that exposure to the promoter and the antioxidants was simultaneous.

Every single one of the ingredients showed incredible levels of tumour inhibition, far higher than that shown by the real treatment linked to previously. If I were a mouse genetically engineered to get a type of skin cancer who happened to have accidentally been injected with a potent carcinogen, and to be unfortunate enough to be on a drip of a drug which promoted the growth of cancer, it seems like this product would be well worth a look. Any other species, any other sort of cancer? Well, we'd have to look at the peer reviewed evidence.

Of course, this product is just a vitamin and antioxidant supplement, which contains the usual stuff, including a number of substances that in real people have been shown promote cancer when taken as a supplement, rather than inhibiting it, such as:

Beta Carotene
Vitamin A
Vitamin E
Vitamin C

Furthermore, the claims that taking combinations of these substances improved their effect is the opposite of what has been found in real studies. Combining beta carotene with vitamin A or vitamin E actually kills more people than either ingredient alone. Source.

There is therefore no chance whatever that the lab results shown in its website have any meaning for cancer patients.

Cancer Research UK advise as follows about all food supplements:

" We need a lot more research in this area before we will know for sure which vitamin and diet supplements may play a role in helping treat, prevent or control cancer. The best way to get the vitamins and minerals you need is through a balanced and varied diet, with plenty of fruit and vegetables. Vitamin supplements don’t have the same benefits as naturally occurring vitamins in fruit and vegetables."

And of course we now know that for those receiving active treatment, antioxidants and vitamin C can block the effects of chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Source.

Someone has suggested on the What Now site that explaining all of the above is unnecessary, and that the last thing the site needs are know-alls telling you all what to think. But here is that same person thanking me for educating them on this very subject after they gave bad advice to someone.

Maybe the site doesn't need know-alls, but know-somethings are useful in situations like this, aren't they? Failing that, the know-nothings could at least not give advice to desperate people in areas they know nothing about.

I see someone has started a new "natural treatment" thread on WN. I'll be interested to see if Gary's polite and sound advice is well-taken. History suggests no, but the site is under moderator lockdown whilst my complaint is being investigated, so who knows?

Labels: Biovitali, Cancer, Clinical, Diet, evidence, immune system, Malignant, Medicine, Melanoma, Nature, promotion, quack, Supplements, Trial, Vitalcells, Vitamin D, Vitamins

New Sites

A new poster on the melanoma board brought a couple of useful sites to our attention:

Of general interest:Melanoma International Foundation

And for those who are pregnant and have MM:Pregnant With Cancer


DCA, Green Tea, Alternative Medicine

I note also a couple of interesting items in today's British Journal of Cancer:

A study of the effect of green tea drinking concluded that it has no effect on lung cancer.

A review of the evidence suggest that DCA may well be a promising broad spectrum anti-cancer agent.

These interest me because they strike at one of the arguments of the "alternative medicine" touts and apologists. Science is studying the seemingly more promising "alternative" agents.

Mostly, as with green tea, the initial promise evaporates. Detailed investigation shows that the apparent correlation between taking a substance and cancer protection or reversal is not true.

Sometimes however, despite there being no possibility of windfall profits (DCA is an old, cheap drug- I could make it in my kitchen), investigations are carried out and prove encouraging. The review itself notes that drug companies are not going to fund trials, and encourages charities to fund them. It will be interesting to see what happens. I am hopeful, as I do not beleive in the paranoid nonsense about the suppression of cancer cures by big business. A trial has in fact already started in Canada.

What also interests me about DCA is that it started being sold on the internet in an unregulated fashion when word first got out. Like everything else, DCA is a poison at too high a dose. The right dose may however kill cancer and leave people alive. Proper trials will tell us.

Labels: Alternative, Canada, Clinical, DCA, Dichloroacetate, Green Tea, Malignant, Medicine, Melanoma, Nature, Trial