Cancer Decisions - Free Newsletter -August 5, 2007

HERE AT THE MOSS REPORTS

The one thing we all seem to have too little of these days is time. This is as true for the medical profession as it is for everyone else. While your doctor would almost certainly like to spend more time with you, to explain things in more depth and answer patients' questions more fully, the constraints imposed by the increasingly prevalent managed care system conspire to make the allocated time per visit ever shorter.

Robbed of the opportunity to discuss their medical needs thoroughly with their physicians, people often turn to the Internet for answers. Certainly, the Internet has unlocked the medical libraries and made vast quantities of medical literature accessible to everyone. But it has also made available an abundance of unreliable information, often couched in deceptively pseudoscientific language, whose concealed purpose is to sell the unwary a product or service that is essentially worthless. Without the necessary background in the life sciences, it can be extremely hard to discern the fallacies in the sales talk or make sense of journal articles and technical literature.

For thirty years I have been studying cancer and its treatment, monitoring emerging research and writing about new approaches to cancer in the fields of both conventional and alternative medicine. The Moss Reports are the distillation of my long involvement with the field of cancer. Each report presents the available treatment options for a particular cancer diagnosis, discussing the rationale behind the treatment and objectively analyzing the expected success rate, drawbacks and alternatives.

If you would like to order a Moss Report for yourself or someone you love, you can do so from our website, www.cancerdecisions.com, or by calling 1-800-980-1234 (814-238-3367 from outside the US).

PHONE CONSULTATIONS

I also offer phone consultations to clients who have bought a Moss Report. A phone consultation can be enormously helpful in drawing up a treatment strategy and getting one's options clearly prioritized. A recent client offered the following comment:

"I have been diagnosed with an indolent form of non-Hodgkins lymphoma and am not receiving any conventional treatment - I am on "watch and wait." I am therefore exploring all the complementary therapy options in order to avoid ever having to receive chemotherapy. I found the range of CAM options daunting. A telephone consultation with Dr Moss was absolutely invaluable in helping me put together a prioritized plan of action and to discard many options which were inappropriate for my condition. Dr Moss' wisdom, experience and helpful manner have been a tremendous help to me." - M.B.

To schedule an appointment for a phone consultation, please call 1-800-980-1234 (814-238-3367 from outside the US) or email: Jacquie@cancerdecisions.com.

We look forward to helping you.

CURRENT TOPICS

A question that comes up very frequently in phone consultations with my clients is the issue of whether or not it is safe to take antioxidants while undergoing standard cancer treatments such as chemotherapy or radiation.

While there is mounting evidence to suggest that antioxidants are both safe and effective in counteracting the unpleasant side effects of chemotherapy and radiation, by and large the oncology profession tends to recommend strongly against the use of such supportive measures, citing concerns that antioxidants may interfere with the cancer-killing ability of standard treatments.

I have written an investigative report on this controversial subject, exposing the flaws in the arguments so often leveled against the use of antioxidants during cancer therapy. The report - Do Antioxidants and Chemotherapy Conflict? - is available for download from the Cancer Decisions web site: www.cancerdecisions.com.

This report is one of our Current Topics series - a growing list of in-depth analyses that focus on issues of importance to all who are interested in cancer prevention and treatment. Other Current Topics include:

On Guard - Gardasil (An in-depth discussion of the anti-cervical cancer vaccine Gardasil)
Do Antioxidants and Chemotherapy Conflict?
Mammography, Biopsy and the Diagnosis of Breast Cancer
Herceptin or Deceptin? (An evaluation of the use of Herceptin in breast cancer)
Avastin: Your Money Or Your Life. (A clear-eyed look at the targeted drug Avastin)
The Politics of Hope: Andrew von Eschenbach and the Decline of the National Cancer Institute
The Mexican Cancer Clinics in the Era of Evidence-Based Medicine

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A TROPHOBLAST FROM THE PAST – PART ONE

I have spent my summer reading and thinking about the unlikely topic of trophoblasts. Trophoblastic cells form the layer of embryonic tissue that attaches the embryo or fetus to the wall of the mother's uterus. Trophoblasts provide protective armor by completely surrounding the embryo, while also carrying nutrients from the mother's blood to that of the developing fetus. The National Institutes of Health define trophoblast as "the extra-embryonic tissue responsible for implantation, developing into the placenta, and controlling the exchange of oxygen and metabolites between mother and embryo."

The word trophoblast means "original feeding tissue," and was so named by the Dutch embryologist Ambrosius Arnold Willem Hubrecht (1853-1915). He discovered it in the course of his study of the placenta of the hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus). Incidentally, Hubrecht was as fascinated with hedgehogs as I am with trophoblasts. He offered to pay 25 cents for any live hedgehog that was brought to him (Richardson, 1999). At one point, as many as 40 hedgehogs a day were brought in. Out of this ‘slaughter of the innocents' came our first inkling of the existence of the peculiar trophoblastic tissue. But soon trophoblasts were identified in other mammals, including man - or, rather, woman.

Even in scientific circles, trophoblast biology is an arcane subject. I have seen puzzled expressions on the faces of many people with whom I discuss my obsession. Even many physicians look a bit embarrassed, as they desperately rack their brains for some obscure facts about trophoblast left over from medical school days.

Most Western people are vaguely aware of the placenta, or "afterbirth," which is the final act in the life drama of the trophoblast. In some cultures, the placenta is honored. According to one author, the Balinese wash the placenta in perfumed water after birth, wrap it in a cloth, and then bury it on the threshold of the family home in a carefully prepared coconut (Young 2001).

The ancient Egyptians preserved the Pharaoh's placenta in a special jar. The Japanese used to bury placentas in a cedar wood placental pot, and even today the Web site of the Osaka City Bureau of Waste Management offers to dispose of an afterbirth for 1,700 Yen (about $14 USD). Since their Web site shows a picture of an elaborate "afterbirth mound," I assume that their idea of waste management includes a suitable ritualistic burial for this neglected tissue. By contrast, most Western hospitals simply treat afterbirth as a waste product to be disposed of with the other biohazardous trash.

Perhaps our haste to dispose of afterbirth reveals some subliminal fear. In fact, one leading expert on placentas, Dame Anne McLaren of the Gurdon Institute of Cancer, Cambridge, revealed in a scientific account last year that she had "always found trophoblast rather scary." (Sadly, Dame McLaren died in an auto accident on July 10, 2007.)

Trophoblasts are unique in many ways, not least their explosive growth rate. In the mouse, for example, between days 3 and 7 after conception there is a 500-fold increase in tissue volume. This is mainly due to the power of the burgeoning trophoblast. What is more, "trophoblast is able to organize its own program of development within a well-defined time span that is independent of the embryo," according to Y.W. Loke of King's College, Cambridge.

Although the placenta comes between the mother and the developing baby, it is independent of both. It arises before the embryo - the first differentiation of the fertilized egg is into trophoblast - and it has a separate life cycle. Having done its remarkable job, it dies upon delivery of the afterbirth, while the baby (hopefully) goes forward to a long and glorious life. Both scary and autonomous, and growing at an enormous rate, it is rather like the Monster that Ate Pittsburgh.

TO BE CONCLUDED, WITH REFERENCES, NEXT WEEK.

--Ralph W. Moss, Ph.D.

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IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER

The news and other items in this newsletter are intended for informational purposes only. Nothing in this newsletter is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice.