Cancer:

          The power of Belief and a Talisman

 The Power of hard Science -- 

         Oxygen's role in defeating cancer

“I wore [the locket Bob lent me] in the hospital. It meant a lot to me is all I can say, and I wasn’t willing to give it back until I felt myself again. That was what Bob told me to do. I had it for, probably, a month.”

This patient had been diagnosed with a most malignant  squamous cell carcinoma that had invaded her pelvic cul-de-sac. Dramatic debulking surgery was required as a matter of urgency, since a lot of organs were now being invaded and compromised.

The patient was told by one oncologist that the metastatic process was so advanced that she was considered inoperable. 

 "I did five ‘dives’ in the oxygen chamber before and after each surgery. I was out of the hospital from that first surgery in three days. So I was all excited, realizing what it does for surgery. I don’t know what it does for cancer but I know what it does for surgery. You would think these doctors would see that. 'You should refer all of your patients for hyperbarics'

My oncologist looked at me like I was from outer space. 'You should save your money. Go get a massage. It does about the same for you.'

She didn’t even want to know. That’s what’s so disheartening to me. I don’t even tell her anymore. She sees people like me every day. That’s her job. You’d think she would want to know."

Sandsie's Comments:

First the Talisman. Twenty years ago my Wise-Old-Aussie-Bush-Mum said to me "Time is your Golden Coin - do not squander it nor let others pilfer it." She then asked me to define those to words.

"Sure, Mum -- 'squander is to waste time."

"No," says Mum "if you want to waste a bit of your time, it is your choice. Squander is what drug-addicts do -- they hose their years away. Like winning a million dollars one week and being broke by the weekend. Now about 'pilfer"

"Sure, Mum. Don't  let people steal your time."

"Ha, Bobby, you almost have it. But pilfering is sly theft."

Since Mum made that observation to me I always I carry the golden coin as a daily reminder. I was happy to loan it to the patient. She only returned it and said "Thanks. I now know I am going to live."

Her "life belief" was about five years ago -- even though after her surgery she was told that she had only a 15% chance of living for one year. She remains healthy and continues with spasmodic hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Here is the latest Medical Science from Duke University. I am puzzled however, having been guest at the F.G.Hall Environmental Lab' at Duke -- America's most exotic system of hyperbaric chambers -- as to why they do  not treat their cancer patients in their chambers nor collaborate between medical departments. 

A pity.

The Latest Science explains why this patient remains cancer free:

Scan Detects Oxygen Levels in Tumors

1. April 23 (HealthDay News) -- New research suggests that scientists are close to developing a simple way to measure oxygen levels in tumors, giving doctors a heads-up about what kind of treatment is best for individual patients.

The findings fit into an emerging trend of individualized treatment for patients with cancer instead of treating people the same way, said Dr. Mark Dewhirst, a professor of radiation oncology at Duke University Medical Center.

"If successful, [the trend] will revolutionize the way that we treat cancer," said Dewhirst, who co-wrote a commentary accompanying the new study, published April 22 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Scientists began realizing the important role of oxygen in tumors about 50 years ago, said study co-author James Mitchell, branch chief of radiation biology at the U.S. National Cancer Institute's Center for Cancer Research. The scientists discovered that tumors with higher concentrations of oxygen were more susceptible to radiation, he said.

"Radiation damages cells by causing damage to DNA, and one particular type of damage renders the DNA molecule non-reparable," Mitchell said. But less oxygen in the tumor allows tumor cells to survive more easily by making the DNA destruction process more difficult, he said.

According to Dewhirst, the same is true for chemotherapy drugs, which also don't work as well when tumors have less oxygen.

Lower levels of oxygen create other problems, Dewhirst. "One would think at first that lack of oxygen would make tumors unhealthy and easy to kill," he said. "But actually, the opposite happens -- tumor cells that lack oxygen become more aggressive and more difficult to kill."

Tumors with lower oxygen levels even spread more easily through the body, he said.

Doctors can check oxygen levels in patients by inserting a needle. But doctors can't insert needles into some patients, and. in others, it's difficult to insert the needle deep enough, Mitchell said. In the new study, the researchers tested a scanning technique called pulsed electron paramagnetic resonance imaging and used it in tandem with magnetic resonance imaging. The study authors said they were able to successfully measure oxygen levels in tumors in mice by using the non-invasive technology.

"The imaging that is described in this study provides all of the information necessary to evaluate oxygen levels in tumors as well as to examine underlying causes for the lack of oxygen," Dewhirst said. "The fact that all of the imaging is completely non-invasive provides the ability to perform this measurement more than once, (meaning) this could be used to monitor the effectiveness of cancer therapy."