When a child or teenager is diagnosed with cancer, the entire family is stunned.  Cancer is an enormous challenge, and many difficult decisions must be made under intense stress.

Parents have the right to be fully informed about the benefits and risks of each treatment and that there are other options, before signing parental consent.  This page provides in-depth, comprehensive information about Alternative, Conventional, Complementary (CAM) or Integrated treatment choices used by highly respected, advanced cancer experts from around the world:

• ◆ Naturopathic Medical Doctors (NMD/ND)
• ◆ Doctors of Osteopathy (DO)
• ◆ Medical Doctors (MD)
• ◆ Nutritionists and Herbalists (Certified)

Depending on the type of cancer, most oncologists want to hospitalize the child immediately and begin aggressive conventional (orthodox) treatments.  These include a combination of surgery, radiation, and toxic drugs known as chemotherapy.

SECOND OPINION RECOMMENDED!

GENERAL SUMMARY

By definition, alternative natural cancer therapies can best be understood as a comprehensive approach using select combinations of the safest, most effective treatments, instead of toxic drugs or radiation, and often without surgery.

Natural medicine dates back to 3,000 BC when knowledgeable healers used herbs, organic whole foods, pure water, rest, and moderate sun exposure to heal disease and improve one’s health by strengthening the immune system.

Today, scientists have discovered that Nature provides an astonishing 400 nontoxic, effective therapies that directly or indirectly destroy cancer cells without harming normal cells, reverse the disease, and restore health in most cases.

Natural treatments offer new hope for achieving “spontaneous remission” or a total cure without dangerous side effects.  Every day, researchers are making new discoveries about natural sources of healing. And more patients are demanding natural treatments.

These therapies are not to be confused with so-called alternative treatments such as acupuncture, meditation, hypnosis, massage, biofeedback, yoga, Reiki, etc. (See COMPLEMENTARY/CAM).  Keep in mind also that alternative cancer treatments are not some “amazing cure” you buy over the Internet, hawked by a stranger.

You may be warned by the doctor and medical websites that the only approved treatments for cancer are conventional.  They deliberately create a sense of fear by claiming that natural therapies are not “scientifically proven” or “may even cause harm,” and that alternative doctors are “quacks.”

Why the open hostility? Historically speaking, the allopathic medical community and drug companies have attacked natural healing as “quackery” for more than 100 years.  Incredibly, studies on natural remedies paid for by the allopathic Cancer Establishment have been exposed as deliberately “tweaked” to appear to not be effective, so they can claim they aren’t  scientifically proven, says cancer expert Dr. Ralph Moss.

Naturopathic physicians (N.M.D./N.D.) receive the same  comprehensive medical training as medical doctors (M.D.) and doctors of osteopathy (D.O.). But their approach to cancer is to treat the whole body and reverse cancer by getting rid of the cause.

Alternative cancer treatments have grown into a large grassroots movement that demands acceptance and is gathering power and momentum.  Sooner or later, all doctors will have to agree that natural remedies do offer the best hope for cures.

According to Dr. Joseph Mercola, himself trained in both allopathic and alternative medicine: “There are 85 ‘unproven’ cancer drugs used today in toxic, conventional treatments.  Effective cancer treatment is a matter of definition.  The FDA defines an ‘effective’ chemo drug as one which achieves a 50% or more reduction in tumor size in 28 days.  In the vast majority of cases there is absolutely no correlation between shrinking a tumor in 28 days, and the cure of the cancer, or extension of life for the patient.”

Germany has, for decades, been the mecca for advanced natural cancer cures. People from all over Europe and the Americas - including royalty, presidents, celebrities, and physicians - have traveled to cancer treatment centers in Germany.  It’s the best-kept secret in the world.

According to German Cancer Therapies (2003) by Dr. Morton Walker – himself a physician, professional medical journalist, and authority on nutrition and alternative cancer healing methods – European doctors have been healing cancer for more than 100 years using specific combinations of ~

• ◆ Herbal remedies
• ◆ Nutraceuticals
• ◆ Organic nutrition & juices
• ◆ Gene therapy
• ◆ Vitamins & Minerals by IV
• ◆ Hyperthermia
• ◆ Phytonutrients from plants
• ◆ Water treatments
• ◆ Enzymes
• ◆ Detoxification
• ◆ Immunotherapy
• ◆ Oxygen therapy

“No single treatment stands alone,” says Dr. Walker.  Rather, oncologists combine therapies that are fully documented and proven to work together, synergistically, to strengthen, nourish, and fortify the body’s immune system so it can seek out and destroy cancer cells.   Side effects are rare, and mild if they are experienced at all.

Most oncologists in North America don’t read European science journals. If they did, they would realize that there are more than 15,000 physicians worldwide who treat cancer patients with safe, effective plant-based medicines. Their studies and treatments are documented in more than 16,000 articles in peer-reviewed science publications. To claim that they are “unproven” is misleading.  By contrast, articles in American medical journals are slanted toward using drugs and radiation for cancer. Articles that report success with alternative treatments are simply not published in the U.S. medical journals.

Some states or countries won’t allow a patient to use alternative cancer treatments unless they also have conventional treatments.

Billy Best was 16 years old in 1994 when diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.   After five toxic chemo treatments, Billy ran away to avoid more chemo.  Two months later his cancer returned.  He went home after his parents agreed that he could try alternative treatments.  His orthodox doctor claimed Billy would die without chemo. But Billy refused, and instead changed his diet to include lots of fresh vegetables and fruit, and eliminated processed foods, sugar, and red meat.  One of the two natural treatments he used daily was nine ounces of Essiac, a “tea” brewed with organic herbs and pure water.  Within two and a half months, tests at Dana Farber Cancer Institute Boston showed his cancer was completely gone, thanks to the natural treatments!  Billy is now 38 years old, healthy, and his cancer never returned. His success story is one of thousands.

If you have a minor child diagnosed with cancer and prefer natural alternative treatments, you may need to consult a law firm qualified to advise you on possible legal challenges from the State.

Many times, parents have been bullied into giving written parental consent for toxic, conventional treatments before they understood the extent of the risks.  After their child’s health worsened, they decide to go elsewhere for natural care. Incredibly, doctors have been known to report parents to the local Child Protection agencies, who tell the Court that the parents’ refusal for “standard” treatments is a “criminal offense."  The doctor may testify that the child should be legally forced to take chemo or radiation. Parents who flee with their child to seek alternative treatments are often arrested for kidnapping their own child!  The medical system is flawed, say advocates, when a Child Protection agent with no medical training has a say in what is best for a child’s health.

Sometimes the Court agrees with the parents when their attorney shows “medical evidence” that it is not in the best interest of the child to be poisoned or burned to kill cancer cells.  At times the media will provide intense coverage about the child’s situation, and outspoken  public support for the parents’ rights has been known to sway a judge in favour of alternative treatments for their child.

Parents insist that they deserve the freedom of choice to take their child or teen to a licensed, board-certified pediatrician who has extensive training in natural medicine for childhood cancers. Critics argue that without standard, conventional treatments, the child’s life is endangered. Each state should pass new laws that protect the rights of parents to choose treatments they feel impressed are best for their child, after researching all options without harassment from Child Protection agencies and the Courts.  A recent high-profile pediatric oncology court case resulted in “Abraham’s Law.”

Lawyers should offer to represent families, pro bono if necessary, to help them face a legal challenge over alternative childhood cancer treatment options.  A recent Internet-based survey in Ohio found that 83% of nearly 400 respondents voiced strong support for parents’ rights, not the State’s, to choose treatments for their children.

Thanks to loud public outcry against government agencies and the Courts who force girls and boys to endure toxic, harmful conventional treatments, judges have sometimes dismissed charges of “neglect” brought against parents who prefer nontoxic cures - the Court apparently is satisfied when the family and their lawyer show that the child battling cancer with alternative, natural therapies will be under the care of a “Licensed physician who meets minimal standard care.”

Practitioners of orthodox cancer treatments have been in the majority for 60 years. Allopathic oncologists will treat childhood cancers aggressively with a combination of conventional treatments:

• ◆ Surgeries
• ◆ Radiation
• ◆ Chemotherapy drugs
• ◆ Drugs to treat “side effects”

• ◆ Bone marrow transplant
• ◆ Stem cell transplant
• ◆ Blood transfusions

The most widely used cancer treatment worldwide is chemotherapy, or chemo, which are patented, highly toxic, costly “designer poisons” intended to circulate throughout the blood stream to kill cancer cells that spread from the original cancer site.  It is tragic that chemo drugs also kill healthy cells, and severely damage the child’s immune system, inviting life-threatening infections. 

Incredibly, chemo has a dismal 3% - 5% “success” rate as a cure and many chemo drugs are themselves carcinogenic!  The International Agency for Research on Cancer – part of the World Health Organization – lists at least 30 toxic chemo drugs as likely to cause a second or third cancer later in life that is more aggressive.

·  Anemia   

·  Appetite loss 

·  Baldness 

·  Bleeding: rectum, vagina

·  Bladder inflammation, blood in urine

·  Blindness

·  Bruises

·  Bone marrow destruction

·  Candida: Thrush 

·  Convulsions

·  “Chemo brain” (retardation, confusion, learning problems)

·  Constipation 

·  Dehydration

·  Depression

·  Dry mouth

·  Delirium

·  Difficulty walking, changes in motor skills

·  Discoloration of skin

·  Dizziness 

·  Double vision 

·  Drooling

·  Ear damage, hearing loss 

·  Edema, fluid retention 

·  Fatigue

·  Fever 

·  Headaches 

·  Heart damage, heart failure 

·  Infections

·  Immune system damage 

·  Kidney damage 

·  Liver damage

·  Loss of sensation 

·  Muscle pain 

·  Mouth ulcers, bleeding lips

·  Pain 

·  Paralysis 

·  Rash, skin problems, sensitive to the sun    

·  Reproductive organ damage, sterility 

·  Stunted growth

·  Sleeping problems 

·  Sloughing of the entire lining of the intestines 

·  Taste changes, bland or metallic 

·  Weakness 

·  Weight loss

THE CHALLENGE

CHEMO BONUSES

Doctors face the challenge of guessing whether or not the combination of drugs known as the “chemo cocktail” will effectively poison all the cancer cells, shrink a solid tumor, or cause too many debilitating side effects for the child. Treatments are given in cycles of daily, weekly, or monthly, and may continue for nearly five years!  Some cancer cells become even more aggressive and resistant to the drugs, so different combinations may be tested as treatments.  Cancer cells that do not respond are likely to cause a second, more aggressive cancer years later that is difficult to cure or is fatal. 

Despite chemo drugs high rate of failure to cure cancer, major medical centers and drug companies compensate oncologists with “chemo bonuses” (cash) as a financial incentive to prescribe certain expensive, anti-cancer drugs, including for terminally ill patients with no hope of recovery, reported Life Extension (November 2007).

SIDE EFFECTS OF RADIATION

According to cancer specialists and scientists, “ironizing radiation is a known carcinogen in humans.”  Radiation causes cancer!  Yet it is commonly used as a cancer treatment.  Its lethal burning effects are shown to both mutate and sterilize all cells in its path, including healthy cells along with cancer cells.

Children will usually be given 30 - 40 radiation treatments, lasting about 15 - 20 minutes every day, and may continue for several weeks.  The radiologist will use a specific type of machine to direct a high-energy beam of ionizing radiation toward the area of the body to be treated.  A plastic mask on the head helps keep the child still.

Radiation therapy is not particularly helpful in killing cancer cells that have spread to other parts of the body.  As with chemo drugs, the conventional doctor’s mindset is: “The primary goal is to manage and control the cancer and this takes priority over side effects.”

Children treated with radiation and chemo - both toxic therapies - face an increased risk of developing a second, more aggressive cancer by tenfold, says Samuel Epstein, M.D., cancer expert.

Radiation itself is not painful, although the side effects may be severe:

• ◆ Burns and damage to skin at site of treatment 
• ◆ Breathlessness
• ◆ Candida (Thrush infection) 
• ◆ Depression 
• ◆ Diarrhea 
• ◆ Dry cough
• ◆ Difficulty swallowing food  
• ◆ Drowsiness 
• ◆ Fatigue 
• ◆ Fever
• ◆ Food tastes metallic or bland 
• ◆ Hair loss, baldness 
• ◆ Headaches
• ◆ Inflamed bladder, painful to urinate 

• ◆ Loss of appetite
• ◆ Mucous-like discharge or bleeding from rectum 
• ◆ Muscle cramps
• ◆ Nausea, vomiting 
• ◆ Scar tissue 
• ◆ Sensitivity to sun and cold winds
• ◆ Skin feels sore, itchy, burned, turns red, peels 
• ◆ Sore, dry mouth
• ◆ Swelling 
• ◆ Tooth decay 
• ◆ Unsteadiness 
• ◆ Weakness 
• ◆ Weight loss

A bone marrow transplant may be recommended as a potential life-saving medical procedure for a child whose bone marrow is damaged from intensive chemotherapy or radiation.  Toxic treatments given in high doses will utterly destroy bone marrow cells, causing the child to die from infection, anemia, or bleeding if they do not receive healthy new marrow from a transplant.

Bone marrow is found inside the “core” of long bones and also in the soft, spongy center of flat bones found in the body.  Each cell in the marrow has a vitally important function to maintain life.

Making a decision for a bone marrow transplant is difficult because of severe side effects and life-threatening risks.  It is transplanted into the child the same way a blood transfusion is given, by a catheter inserted into a vein after it has been harvested from a donor and filtered.

Complications of a transplant include:

• ◆ Viral or fungal infection 
• ◆ Low red blood cell or platelet count
• ◆ Pneumonia 
• ◆ A graft failure from immune system rejection
• ◆ Damage to major organs 

Conventional oncologists admit that a bone marrow transplant is the last hope for cancers that don’t respond to toxic treatments.

Allopathic (orthodox) doctors are sometimes prohibited from treating your child with alternative therapies alone, but are permitted to allow some noncompeting therapies to help relieve the debilitating side effects caused by toxic chemotherapy and radiation.

Known as Complementary or Integrated, the Cancer Establishment has finally relented a little and permits nutritional support, multivitamins, massage, acupuncture, meditation, yoga, and aromatherapy to supposedly help with the side effects and “quality of life” while the patient endures chemo or radiation.

The American Cancer Society makes it clear that:

“Complementary methods are not offered as cures for cancer.”

It is questionable how much Complementary Therapies physically help adults.  Studies show they don’t help children or teens cope with painful toxic treatments. The one exception that cheers up kids battling cancer is to have gentle pets visit patients in hospitals. 

Despite heroic efforts, many children do not survive.  Cancer is the leading cause of death by disease in babies, children, and teenagers.  It is more deadly than AIDS, Asthma, Cystic Fibrosis, Diabetes, Muscular Dystrophy, and Tuberculosis combined.

Although there are many compassionate physicians caring for children battling cancer, it is clear that current conventional treatment approaches as dictated by the Cancer Establishment monopoly are a colossal failure.

People wonder why more doctors don’t stand up to them and demand they be allowed to use natural, nontoxic, effective, European - proven therapies so that more lives will be saved!

In the future, historians will look back at the expensive, barbaric cancer protocols: surgery, radiation, chemo drugs – “cut, burn, poison” – promoted for 60 years in the war against cancer, and shake their heads in amazement. 

Just as we wonder, looking back at doctors in the past, who used bizarre treatments such as blood-letting or heavy doses of mercury to treat strep throat, or tried to cure smallpox by hanging red cloth around the patient’s bed, or by hammering an ice pick through an eye socket to calm a mental illness, or prescriptions of nasty powdered mummy flesh for heart problems.

Cancer claims the life of an innocent child every 3 hours, 11 minutes, and 40 seconds. And if a child survives toxic therapies, doctors admit they are usually destined to suffer ongoing health challenges for the rest of their lives, including possibly more cancers.

If you feel that Nature promises better cures for children battling killer cancer, and want to see changes in the way cancer is treated, then please take a moment today and donate to Children Against Cancer.  Help fund life-saving research.

Thank you!