Cheap, safe cure for most cancers?
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blutoski
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Yep. This is not 'new' information. In fact, it's the basis of an entire field of healthfraud that claims cancer is caused/fed by eating refined sugars.
Google: "cancer and sugar".
Most eukaryotes have a mechanism that leads to apoptosis and SOS. It's triggered by a list of unusual metabolic behaviors. This system is contained within the mitochnodria, and when they're disabled, cells that have gone awry fail to destroy themselves. This is one reason cancer cells are immortal - they have defeated the several of the cell's built-in safety features.
The chemical in question is re-activating the mitochondria, so the self-destruct mechanism can be triggered.
It depends upon what you mean by "cheap" and "safe", but there are several cancers that are curative with minor procedures (polyp removal for colon cancer, cryotherapy for cervical dysplasia, excision for various cancers that tend to be local like skin cancer). Methotrexate is curative for gestational trophoblastic cancer. Not much else is coming to mind off the top of my head.
Linda
SteveGrenard
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Originally Posted by Trying2Bopen
yes, which is probably why there is an extensive literature on radiating cancers while the victim and his/her tumours are enclosed in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. Although it is mostly used to prevent/ ameliorate tissue injury complications associated with radiation treatment, there are some researchers who feel it also enhances the treatment.
yes, which is probably why there is an extensive literature on radiating cancers while the victim and his/her tumours are enclosed in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. Although it is mostly used to prevent/ ameliorate tissue injury complications associated with radiation treatment, there are some researchers who feel it also enhances the treatment.
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blutoski
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I saw a student article about how the Media (as well as any private funding sources) have ignored this possible cheap, safe, cancer treatment. Being a skeptic, I checked it out. Because you might think a possible cure for ANY cancer would be big news. And a safe, known substance, that is dirt cheap and can be tested in Phase II right away, would be really big news. That the Media would just ignore this, doesn't make sense. Conspiracy theory and all that.
So Google me some News.
Results 1 - 10 of about 59 for Dichloroacetate.
Hmmm, very few stories, hardly any MegaMedia names at all there. A lot of woo sounding stuff about how it won't get funding, how this discovery is being ignored by the press, how it will never be tested.
Maybe Google isn't working. Lets search for acetate.
416 for acetate.
OK, Google is working. (damn, a lot of stories about acetate, breaking news there)
So being a skeptic, check some News sites.
FOX
http://search2.foxnews.com/search?i...*&filter=0&sort=date:D:S:d1&q=Dichloroacetate
0 results
ABC
http://abcnews.go.com/search?searchtext= Dichloroacetate&type=feature
0 hits
NBC
http://nbc.resultspage.com/search?ts=custom&p=Q&uid=400427844&w=Dichloroacetate
0 hits
BBC
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/sea...tate&btn=Search&uri=/?ok&scope=all&go=toolbar
Sorry
There are no results for "Dichloroacetate" on the BBC website.
WTF? Did I spell this wrong?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dichloroacetate
No, that is correct. OK something is fookin nuts here.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/?search=MS...bmit=Search&id=11881780&FORM=AE&os=0&gs=1&p=1
3 hits
Aha! See? The media isn't ignoring the story! No wait, those are all stories about the original story. Jan 22, 23 2007
Hmmm... OK skeptics, debunkin time.
Google News search for "Cancer" stories, 66,838 for cancer.
Google News for cancer+dichloroacetate
about 58 for cancer dichloroacetate.
WTF???
Looks like the media is ignoring the story. How strange.
Or Possibly that 'three minutes of google search' = 'comprehensive review of the media' is a flawed theory. One problem with search engines at network news is that they purge stories after a couple of days. It also doesn't necessarily reflect what they broadcast. Remember: most news is created by the local affiliates, not by the network.
Also be mindful that 'cancer cure discovered' is a daily event, since every quack and his dog make this claim. It would be different if it was a clinical trial. And this isn't even an American story: the researcher's lab is in Alberta.
Despite these disadvantages, the story did seem to have legs:
- Google: "DCA Cancer Cure" (278,000 hits)
- CBC
- Globe & Mail
- National Post
- ABC News
- NBC News
- New Scientist
- Science Daily
- Economist
A few minutes of searching.
The other concern is that the substance is quite toxic. One of the other posters suggested that it may be useful for patients with non-cancer mitochondrial defects. The answer is: it's been tried, but has limited appeal due to its toxicity.
I like this attempt in 1983: NEJM: Treatment of lactic acidosis with dichloroacetate. Trial result: no survivors... but it did what they thought it would do.
The other important fact is that this property of cancer - the disabling of the mitochondria - is only present in some cancers, and totally absent in others. If anything, the report would read: "Alberta researcher says highly toxic drug may work on some cancers - not actually tested."
Oncologists hear this story every day. It is only one of thousands of potential cures for specific cancer types. My prediction, however, is that like the others, it will not pan out in clinical trials. That's just playing the odds.
See: Respectful Insolence.
SteveGrenard
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To loosely paraphrase Paracelsus ... all substances (e.g. stuff) are poisons ...he said there is nothing which is not a poison ....
the difference between a poison and a cure is the dose (amount, quanity)...
add to that frequency of dosing........
which is a very good reason why nobody should be calling up a supplier and throwing their credit card at them for a kilogram of the stuff and then trying it out. It's this kind of thinking that often prevails with internet providers of miracle cures, herbals and the like.
Agreed, at the proper dosing/frequency DCA has "tolerable" side effects but without those knowns it could be either useless or dangerous.
the difference between a poison and a cure is the dose (amount, quanity)...
add to that frequency of dosing........
which is a very good reason why nobody should be calling up a supplier and throwing their credit card at them for a kilogram of the stuff and then trying it out. It's this kind of thinking that often prevails with internet providers of miracle cures, herbals and the like.
Agreed, at the proper dosing/frequency DCA has "tolerable" side effects but without those knowns it could be either useless or dangerous.
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I checked, and Google News doesn't purge after a few days. But it is obvious Google News doesn't show every news story either.
blutoski
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Further, I wouldn't consider Google News to be a 'mainstream media outlet'.
This was a mundane story that the media treated with mundane coverage.
blutoski
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I did. All the patients in the study I linked to - which is a peer-reviewed study in a medical journal - died. Your links appear to be TV channels. Are you saying reporters (who probably researched the story for all of half an hour) are more accurate than peer-reviewed journals (whose authors probably worked with this substance for years)?
The doses for the conditions in your link are different than those proposed for these cancer treatments. But we won't really know until trials complete.
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SteveGrenard
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Press Release on DCA
I decided to google this as well and I came across this very interesting document from a few weeks ago. As a press release I am posting it all. It speaketh volumes for itself:
Attention News/Business/Health Editors:
http://www.cnw.ca/fr/releases/archive/January2007/23/c8535.html
DCA Drug Development Company, CardioMetabolics Inc., Encouraged by Intense Public Interest in Dichloroacetate for Treatment Of Cancer
Unrelated news announcements? I doubt it...not that I am saying this isn't a typical small pharma with big plans which may or may not pay off for them. This does address the earlier issue of who is going to do the clinical trials, patent protection and so forth. I wish them luck.
...and wow, you can call the CEO's cel phone for more info!
I decided to google this as well and I came across this very interesting document from a few weeks ago. As a press release I am posting it all. It speaketh volumes for itself:
Attention News/Business/Health Editors:
http://www.cnw.ca/fr/releases/archive/January2007/23/c8535.html
DCA Drug Development Company, CardioMetabolics Inc., Encouraged by Intense Public Interest in Dichloroacetate for Treatment Of Cancer
Unrelated news announcements? I doubt it...not that I am saying this isn't a typical small pharma with big plans which may or may not pay off for them. This does address the earlier issue of who is going to do the clinical trials, patent protection and so forth. I wish them luck.
...and wow, you can call the CEO's cel phone for more info!
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Idiot or Troll? You decide...
Yeah, but only an idiot would try to connect the DCA with the deaths. Thats why I suggest you read your sources.
The deaths had nothing to do with DCA. The side effects of DCA are well know. The news agencies fact checkers know this, I know it, and now you might know it.
No, I am saying you should read your sources, and not try to blow smoke up my ass. The DCA side effects are no mystery. It won't kill you, and the side effects are well known.
Yeah, but only an idiot would try to connect the DCA with the deaths. Thats why I suggest you read your sources.
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content...is&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT
The deaths had nothing to do with DCA. The side effects of DCA are well know. The news agencies fact checkers know this, I know it, and now you might know it.
No, I am saying you should read your sources, and not try to blow smoke up my ass. The DCA side effects are no mystery. It won't kill you, and the side effects are well known.
I let this pass; but now it seems I should not have done so because people are trying to find the wrong stuff. The only relevant products are the isolated, bolded salts. Even then, I suppose the one that was studied was the sodium salt. An amateur, data-dump like this can really hurt a desperate person who can't tell the differences among the compounds.
It is possible that someone has already tried DCA (as in dichloroacetic acid) and been badly burned by it.
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/02/an_uninformative_experiment_on_dichloroa.php#c348844
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United States Patent 4631294, Treatment of cerebral ischemia with dichloroacetate
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4631294.html
If dichloroacetate is patented, then the details should be available. You might think. This isn't a new drug, it isn't untested, and it certainly isn't dangerous when used correctly. You might think some other country, that doesn't make treatments illegal, will be the first to find out if it works or not.
"Where to buy dichloroacetate" is still the number one search on Google. You can just see the future here, sites selling it, the money, the profit, the deaths...
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4631294.html
If dichloroacetate is patented, then the details should be available. You might think. This isn't a new drug, it isn't untested, and it certainly isn't dangerous when used correctly. You might think some other country, that doesn't make treatments illegal, will be the first to find out if it works or not.
"Where to buy dichloroacetate" is still the number one search on Google. You can just see the future here, sites selling it, the money, the profit, the deaths...
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http://www.depmed.ualberta.ca/dca/ website for information updates.
Yep. It would be real easy to do Phase III trials on this. You wouldn't have to pay anybody, and there would be countless subjects, of all kinds. After all, if you are going to be dead in 6 weeks, you would try anything.
I thought the same thing. It wouldn't even cost much. Too bad you can't charge $33,000 a month for treatment with this. If you could, it would already be going to trials.
Has there ever been a cheap, safe cure for any cancer? Ever?
And just to put an end to dumb fear mongering,
Yep. It would be real easy to do Phase III trials on this. You wouldn't have to pay anybody, and there would be countless subjects, of all kinds. After all, if you are going to be dead in 6 weeks, you would try anything.
I thought the same thing. It wouldn't even cost much. Too bad you can't charge $33,000 a month for treatment with this. If you could, it would already be going to trials.
Has there ever been a cheap, safe cure for any cancer? Ever?
And just to put an end to dumb fear mongering,
http://www.stanford.edu/group/hopes/treatmts/ebuffer/j4.html
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But to be fair,
Oh boy. Here we go again.
http://health.yahoo.com/experts/healthnews/2008/dca-long-awaited-cancer-killer-not-so-fast
Oh boy. Here we go again.
Nonsense. Only 15% of lung cancer cases can be helped by current methods, and half of those will still die within 5 years.
Nonsense. Until you do trials, you can have no idea what will happen. There is a long painful period in hopeless lung cancer cases, between diagnosis and death. The progression and symptoms of incurable lung cancer are well understood. 85% of the patients are going to die, in pain, and that is just how it is. There are about 186,370 new cases of respiratory cancers in the US alone, each year. There are about 167,050 deaths from respiratory cancers each year, in the US alone. The time between diagnosis and death is well known. If you are one of the 167,050 patients waiting to die, each year, it won't be hard to test any benefits of any substance. Plenty of those people volunteer for trials, or already use alternative treatments, because they have nothing to lose. Nothing.
Nonsense. There is nothing easier than finding terminal cancer patients to do trials on. Here are some of the current trials.
http://www.centerwatch.com/patient/studies/cat34.html
Nobody is going to sue anybody. Such mis-information helps no one.