Natural cures for breast cancer treatment
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4881189/
This is a great article on supplements to take.... I already take Vitamin D and Garlic (sometimes Turmeric), but I will discuss this with my doctor to see all of these supplements are OK/safe to take during treatment.
Has anyone had experience or success with these supplements? Have you discussed with your MO?
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I would caution you aboit using the word "cure". Both people with cancer and medics have reservations about using this word.
As for example it grates a bit on me - as if cure existed and it was me who does not eat enough garlic who is responsible for not being cured. Nobody would have known how successful they are as we do not know how it would have been if we did not take them. I am not convinced about quality of this article but yes, all the products listed have been demonstrated to have anticancer effect. I am sure every single product mentioned had in detail discussion on these boards u others. Please post if you locate articles about a particular supplement demonstrating its activity in a clinical setting indicating dosage.
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that was the title of the pub med article. I don’t believe these are cures per se, but they have demonstrated ability to halt cancer growth. Was interested to hear if people, who do take supplements, subscribe to this thinking or have had success. That is all
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PubMed is a pretty reliable source for info. Cancer treatment in general is a touchy subject with anyone who has or has had cancer. There's so much information and not all of it is reliable but we don't have a lot of time to try every possible avenue to cure ourselves so we turn to medical professionals trusting that they will suggest treatments that work without unnecessary surgeries, chemo, radiation, hormone therapy, etc. I can't speak for everyone but when I read or hear that a simple shot or fruit juice or marijuana or (insert any of the supposed cures here) will cure my cancer I get a little upset because my breasts have been removed, my hair has fallen out, I go through terrible side effects from chemo, I've missed way too much work and I still have another surgery, bone infusions and hormone therapy just for cancer treatments plus more surgeries for reconstruction. If people honestly believe that garlic can cure cancer they must think I'm a complete fool and all of my suffering and disfigurement is for nothing. Do I wish that it was as simple as eating an exotic fruit from Brazil? Of course I do. I have a mutation on my BRCA2 gene though so I really don't think that anything I eat is going to save me from cancer. It isn't the known mutation so geneticists don't even know if or how significant that mutation is to me having breast cancer. What they do know is that my mother and I both have it and we've both had breast cancer.
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My MO agrees that D (which she put me on) may be helpful and isn't opposed to my using turmeric, though she'd prefer in general that I eat a healthy diet and exercise than rely on most supplements.
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so how would you define success , vmb?
How would you know someone or something was successful ?
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They feel good, cancer has not grown or has stabilized, etc. etc. I'm sure everyone's opinion would be different in this regard because ... everyone is different.
I found an pubmed article and posted it in the Complementary and Holistic Medicine treatment board to share with others. If you are offended by the contents of a research article I didn't write, but only shared then I'm sorry.
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ksusan - That's pretty much the advice I've gotten. Healthy diet and exercise. My oncologist says absolutely no alcohol or smoking of any type. My dietitian is a fan of plant based diet. My oncologist is a fan of the Mediteranean diet. My physical therapist, plastic surgeon and oncologist want me to walk at least 30 minutes every day. They just kinda shrug their shoulders as if to say "if you think it helps" when I mention supplements, vitamins and herbs.
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Thanks for posting up the article. There are a lot more foods and supplements that show promise against breast cancer. Too many to remember off the top of my head, but mushrooms, walnuts, oregano are just a few of the whole foods. When it comes to supplements, there are so many. There might be a comprehensive list somewhere.
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I know too many people who followed the healthy lifestyle and still got BC. Several including my sister even had metastatic cancer. No smoking and a drink once in a while and exercised. Didn’t help her.Those are things you should do or not do anyway but I believe in everything in moderation.
I’m 8 years out last August.
Diane
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vmb , self reported feeling of well being although something does not have much to do with cancer cure. If cancer stabilised etc would be not an indicator either as most of us are on conventional treatment and those that are on supplements are usually on multitudes of them. How would you know what was it due to and how long is it going to work for ? How would you know what would the picture be without any supplements ?
So I am afraid while there is a the general list of substances that certainly have anticancer effect which we know already I do not think anybody knows the extent of it.
Apologies for being rather curt in my previous post.
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Vmb, thank you for posting such a comprehensive and detailed article on what herbs and spices affect cancer growth...and more importantly how and why...I will treasure it, and better yet, use the information creatively in my cooking.
Keep up the good work...we need all the help we can get from natural and complimentary medicine to offset the side effects of traditional therapies that will unfortunately and ultimately fail those of us that are already stage four.
If you are not aware, please check out the fenbendazole thread...which is open to everyone, you might find additional useful information on how to block cancer's various pathways with off-label medications and of course many of the natural supplements mentioned in the article above.
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Newly diagnosed but have been heading into a healthier lifestyle prior to dx. I, of course, read almost everything that says "cure." I know, intellectually, there is no "cure" for cancer right now. What there is we label as NED. No Evidence of Disease.
I am planning on an integrative approach but am considering this to be a condition that I will manage for the rest of my life. I will manage it with traditional western medicine, eastern medicine and anything else I feel will be safe and effective.
The quandry of diet, supplements, exercise is that not alot of us are willing to roll the dice with just those interventions. Those of is that do are in the "That quack drinking carrot juice" category. And there aren't enough of us doing that to study with any good scientific measures.
So, we just do the best with what we have. Personally, my hubby bought me a juicer and carrot juice is pretty good! I will also start chemo in a week or two. A friend also bought me a set of enzyme based cleaning products.
It's a give and take but I doubt we will ever have a definitive answer to if there is a natural cure to cancer or if a certain diet, supplements, or exercise can cure cancer. But as more of us adopt a combination of treatments we might get a better feel for what helps us live.
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I am about to start taking Vitamin D supplements since my levels are low (30) and my new general physician says it should be at 50. I remember being as low as 12 about 6-7 years ago. About a year ago, about 6 months before my BC diagnosis, I complained to my former doctor about my Vitamin D levels still being too low and how I heard low levels can make you at risk for cancer. She said don't worry about it and 6 months later, bam, I have cancer just how I predicted. So I dumped her as my doctor and the new one agrees I should take supplements. I was already taking a multi with 2,000 IU, but my new doc said some people need to take 5,000 IU. I'm light skinned so not sure why I have trouble with low levels. I also just started taking turmeric supplements. It sounds like a miracle spice. My doctor said there wasn't enough data that it fights cancer but it can't hurt. I think doctors only want to recommend what big pharma tells them to promote, i.e., things pharmaceutical companies can make money off of. They seem like pawns in a chess game.
Heres a new article linking low vitamin D levels and breast cancer. https://www.breastcancer.org/research-news/low-vitamin-d-levels-found-in-irish-women-w-bc
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I am about to start taking Vitamin D supplements since my levels are low (30) and my new general physician says it should be at 50. I remember being as low as 12 about 6-7 years ago. About a year ago, about 6 months before my BC diagnosis, I complained to my former doctor about my Vitamin D levels still being too low and how I heard low levels can make you at risk for cancer. She said don't worry about it and 6 months later, bam, I have cancer just how I predicted. So I dumped her as my doctor and the new one agrees I should take supplements. I was already taking a multi with 2,000 IU, but my new doc said some people need to take 5,000 IU. I'm light skinned so not sure why I have trouble with low levels. I also just started taking turmeric supplements. It sounds like a miracle spice. My doctor said there wasn't enough data that it fights cancer but it can't hurt. I think doctors only want to recommend what big pharma tells them to promote, i.e., things pharmaceutical companies can make money off of. They seem like pawns in a chess game.
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faith , with vit D I was advised that conventional normal levels (40-90) are low and 90 should be about lower limit. Ideally to be in 100s. vitD and magnesium seem to be two of substances that western people universally depleted of.
My oncologist advised vitD as well; that and vit B6 for neuropathy were the only 2 supplements she recommended.
Why re vitD - it is a complicated multi link process with its production and transformation into active form or whatever. So lots can go wrong. I have read somewhere that it takes 48 mins to move from epidermis to blood stream so if you use soap on your skin in that time you just wash it off and it never happens..
Curcumin (turmeric component) seems to have no downsides whatsoever in normal dosages ( I think in really high ones it is blood thinner - not much of a downside either ) and seems to have so many benefits that it seems beyond debate.
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Curcumin / Tumeric -- I take them but have read that the same part of the liver metabolizes (?) tamoxifen and curcumin, so I don't take the curcumin within 7 hours of taking the tamoxifen.
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It is interesting whether there is clinical relevance to it as I guess that part of liver metabolises lots of food and other medication. I suppose if there is an option to play it safer and take them at separate times then it's a good idea.
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where can I get this list?
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There was a recent study that showed curcumin made a slight lowering of the level of tamoxifen metabolites in women that took it. I will try to find it and post it here. It didn't show that it shut down tamoxifen conversion to its active metabolite, but it had a slight lowering. They called it significant (in a mathematical sense), but whether is has clinical significance is unknown. I'll post an update to this post if I can find it.
Found it:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30909366
Abstract
Tamoxifen is a prodrug that is primarily metabolized into the pharmacologically active metabolite endoxifen and eventually into inactive metabolites. The herb curcumin may increase endoxifen exposure by affecting phase II metabolism. We compared endoxifen and tamoxifen exposure in breast cancer patients with or without curcumin, and with addition of the bio-enhancer piperine. Tamoxifen (20⁻30mg per day (q.d.)) was either given alone, or combined with curcumin (1200 mg three times daily (t.i.d.)) +/- piperine (10 mg t.i.d.). The primary endpoint of this study was the difference in geometric means for the area under the curve (AUC) of endoxifen. Genotyping was performed to determine CYP2D6 and CYP3A4 phenotypes. The endoxifen AUC0⁻24h decreased with 7.7% (95%CI: -15.4 to 0.7%; p = 0.07) with curcumin and 12.4% (95%CI: -21.9 to -1.9%; p = 0.02) with curcumin and piperine, compared to tamoxifen alone. Tamoxifen AUC0⁻24h showed similar results. For patients with an extensive CYP2D6 metabolism phenotype (EM), effects were more pronounced than for intermediate CYP2D6 metabolizers (IMs). In conclusion, the exposure to tamoxifen and endoxifen was significantly decreased by concomitant use of curcumin (+/- piperine). Therefore, co-treatment with curcumin could lower endoxifen concentrations below the threshold for efficacy (potentially 20⁻40% of the patients), especially in EM patients.
KEYWORDS:
curcumin; drug interactions; pharmacokinetics; piperine; tamoxifen
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I went to an integrative oncologist (Dr Keith Block - "Life Over Cancer") for a consult when I was diagnosed, and per his recommendations I took a boatload of supplements during chemo. D3 B6, curcumin, EGCG, fish oil, quercetin, selenium, and another 2 dozen of them. Followed an exercise regime which included intervals on morning of chemo. Kept to an ultra clean organic diet -- largely pescatarian, whole foods, w very limited animal products per his recs. High dose C IVs per his recs.
Beyond his recommendations, I dd hyperbaric Ox, homegrown hyperthermia (heat kills cancer cells if kept at 109 for an hour, and healthy cells are fine to 111), & I followed fasting-mimicking diet prior to each chemo (See Dr Valter Longo).
Diagnosed stage 2B (3C by current guidelines) with a honking TNBC tumor and another huge tumor in one node.
I had complete response to neo adjuvant chemo. All gone/ dead upon lumpectomy.
My hometown MO (who is pretty much by the books, but a very good guy, with whom I was honest, since he respected my right to choose for myself) said afterwards, "I am sure that what you did made a big difference-- you helped yourself a lot. I would never have guessed you would have had this outcome when you walked in to my office."
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Not any of my doctors cares a darn about any supplement. I do take supplements, but here are some of my concerns.
As a horse owner for much of my life, the equine world spends a fortune on supplements that frankly are mostly hype. The problem is delivery and dosage. It is not the product, just our inability to be able to measure any success even though many will swear it helps. God knows I spent a fortune on my beautiful Olivia born with a lousy gut. She clearly had a leaky gut like many humans do. She did live till 21, but only because she was pampered and relieved of ANY stress. Had she been stabled in a typical barn with many horses, she would have died long ago. Everything was stressful to her. I know because she was stabled as such for about 2 yrs and spent most of her time at the hospital or vets coming to the farm. Notice I mentioned STRESS. I just recently took my first vacation in 20 yrs as I was afraid to leave my horses in the care of anybody else.
It is funny to me that doctors roll their eyes at the mere mention of supplements knowing full well that drug development includes natural products from plants. Just watched a video on a lymphoma cancer treatment specifically designed for individual targeting that uses a tobacco plant. Now let that sink in.
I confess I strongly dislike when any treatment promises it is a cure for cancer. There are none. How can we profess a cure when how we get cancer is still a mystery although many possibilities that seem reasonable are offered.
I think stress is a killer. I see it on many faces today and all of these people have serious health issues with many unresolved. Sadly, I am talking about young people. We are a society going around in circles at a dizzy pace. Our diets are horrible. Made even worse, most people are exercising very little today and hence the stress levels just keep building.
I drink a lot of green tea, lemon tea, and turmeric kombucha. I eat a lot of greens every day. I have turned into a rabbit. I do not eat red meat, no alcohol, no pasta, no sweets, and fast every day from 6 pm to noon the next day. I have had breast cancer since I was 40 and I am now 67. 2 primaries, not a reoccurrence. Breast cancer is a chronic disease.
Just my 2 cents.
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1redgirl: I agree with what you say about stress. I think our best chance against cancer is having a strong immune system, saddly stress depress it. I have seen a documentary about low doses naltrexone to boost the immune system. I am taking 3 mg 4 days a week. I guess in my next wbc count I will find out if it works
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1redgirl, I agree with you that stress can play a significant role in the development of disease and possibly in our ability to fight disease. That said, personally I don't believe that stress causes cancer. However if someone has some dormant cancer cells that developed through a gene breakdown/malfunction, I think that stress can be a factor that activates the cancer and gets it to start growing.
I don't think however that for most of us, breast cancer is a chronic disease. While there is no cure for breast cancer (i.e. the disease as a whole), I do think that many of us, as individuals, are cured; we had breast cancer and either through surgery or treatment, all the cancer cells were removed and/or killed off. No cancer remains. The problem is that we can never know who has been cured and who has a some rogue cancer cells still in her body, waiting to develop into a recurrence. Those who develop a recurrence, whether local or distant, obviously were never cured. Those who have metastatic disease will never be considered cured but hopefully treatments can one day (maybe even today for some patients) turn metastatic cancer into a chronic disease. But the rest of us, those who are not Stage IV and who never develop a recurrence, I'd say we've been cured. Of course being cured of one diagnosis of breast cancer doesn't mean that another new breast cancer might not develop in the future. I had bronchitis once. For a couple of years, every time I caught the slightest cold, it would move immediately into my chest - clearly I had not been fully cured. Finally after enough antibiotics, that stopped happening and it hasn't happened now for more than 20 years. So I'd say that I was cured. I might in the future develop bronchitis again but it doesn't mean that the condition was chronic and was there all along - no, it just developed anew. That can happen with most illnesses and diseases, from the common cold to cancer.
Until proven otherwise, I choose to believe that I have no breastcancer in my body and have been successfully treated, i.e. cured.
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I always heard that "we all have cancer cells in our bodies" and the immune system keeps them under control. I guess that's why I emphasize the importance of a strong immune system
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We all have cancer cells in our bodies. My cancer cells over took my immune system when I was 40. Stress. No, stress did not cause my cancer cells, they were already there, but stress caused my immune system to falter. Parents dying, niece dying, moving, overwhelmed me. Had an emotional breakdown. I knew I was sick. Got the shakes. Had 2 surgeries and climbed out of my depressed state. I went 20 plus years. However, I once again allowed life to overwhelm me. Said yes too often. Between family business, managing farm by myself, aging, many animal losses on farm, I knew I was sick again. Yup, got the shakes.
I have changed. I avoid stress. I do a pretty good job of it because I tell family and friends I cannot have stress. I cannot hold people up anymore. I must be selfish and do all I can to live healthy. I have a chronic illness. I am not shy about admitting this. I have changed my entire life. I believe what we eat matters. I believe exercise is very important. I just recently read a fabulous book about sleeping which is so important and something I did little of most of my life.
Cancer cells will grow in the right environment. I am trying to not provide that needed environment.
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1redgirl,
What you say resonates with me. I was originally diagnosed with BC in 2003, after an especially difficult year dealing with a family member who was very difficult and who was ill. I had a recurrence in 2006, after a difficult period at work. My most recent occurrence was diagnosed this past May, after a couple of years where my brother and my mother both passed away and I had to deal with their deaths and their estates, and I switched jobs. So what was significant each of those times? I was run down and overstressed. I also believe this allowed my immune system to fall apart.
Like you, I am now trying to avoid stress as much as possible. I walk away from stressful situations, and try to do calming things. I've downloaded meditation apps, am trying to do more for myself, and hope that this will calm down my immune system enough that it can fight this latest attack.
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The debate over whether there can be natural "cures" for cancer will always be around. Sometimes I sense a touch of snobbery, for lack of better word, from those in the complimentary/alternative world, who claim natural cures and make a person not believing in them feel, like Anotherone says, that they just aren't eating enough garlic or cottage cheese or doing enough coffee enemas to cure themselves.
I've been at this 9 years. Metastatic breast cancer from the start, December 2010. Complimentary treatments like Vitamin D and stress reducing make me feel I can be proactive. But my core belief is that without conventional medicine: chemo, radiation, surgery, aromatase inhibitors, I would not be here this long.
The stress thing is a mixed bag. One does not get through life without a ridiculous amount of stress. How many of us know people who can truly deal well with stress? I know many people who live less than healthy, stressful lives who don't get cancer.
On the other hand, eliminating stress after the mbc diagnosis has been a priority of mine. It's not easy to maintain. While I can do well for stretches of time, stress does pop up! Plus, we cannot control the actions of others. In my case, an aging mother in law had to be dealt with and I could not walk away from her manipulative hold on my husband. Lofty suggestions of “it's how you choose to let it affect you" are more insulting than helpful. Also, progression of this disease, difficult side effects of new meds, job changes leading to health insurance changes all happened to me at once this year and wow, tell me who deals with all that non-stressfully? I just now feel like I may be pulling out of a nosedive depression that's lasted months.
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Divine, yes. And when someone tells you that you should just have a positive attitude and that will make things all better, it's another way of blaming you for doin' it wrong.
As for me, stress? First of all, who knows when my cancer started? I don't know, so I can't attribute it to a stressful or not time period. However, 2018 was one of the best years of my life, full of joy and adventure and people I love. And then in February 2019 I got my diagnosis. Having a great, low-stress year didn't keep me from that.
Managing stress is important, yes!! Being thoughtful about what we eat, yes!! And getting plenty of exercise, double YES YES!!! All this is good and helpful, especially when used along with conventional treatment.
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Stress also affects sleep, and sleep IS biologically relevant: F's up your whole circadian rhythm (night shift workers have more cancer). Cortisol also no good unless it's temporary. Some people's stress is unremitting so their cortisol never gets the "off" signal it would if only summoned for temporary emergencies.
Good point, Mia, that we don't know when our BC got going. I suspect with a grade 3 not that long but it might have incubated as a DCIS for a long time before getting invasive I suppose.
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While eating well, exercise, stress management, etc are all important, cancer is a sneaky bugger. People do all kinds of things to prevent recurrence, some environmental, some medical......still no guarantees. It’s a crap shoot at best. Some will have recurrence regardless of treatment and there will always be those who eat poorly, smoke, drink, don’t exercise, etc and will never have the first bout with any type of cancer.
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