The letter below was recently forwarded to us from a gentleman whose wife is battling breast cancer. We truly appreciate his kind words and eagerness to tell others about integrative cancer treatment and the positive effects it can have in patients' lives. We'd like to share his recommendation with you.
Dear Friend,
I'm sorry this isn't a personalized letter to you and each of the people in my email address book. But I think it's important enough that it should be sent to as many people as I can as quickly possible.
I enjoy recommending good books to people but I rarely email such recommendations to so many on my email address book unless I find something that I feel is important enough to justify interrupting people's busy lives. This recommendation is the most important recommendation that I've ever made (so far).
I know you have a family and friends that you love and whose health you want to protect. I hope you'll invest a few minutes in reading this letter and will forward it to any of your family or friends who you think it might help.
Please allow me a very brief back-story to explain why I feel this book recommendation is so important.
In November 2009 my wife was diagnosed with stage 2b metastatic invasive breast cancer. In the following seven months my wife and I flew six times to The Medical City in the Phillippines for a second opinion, mastectomy, much of her chemotherapy and 35 sessions of radiation. Her cancer went into remission but unfortunately came back in November 2011. This time it had evolved to stage 4 and had metastasised to her chest wall (and now to her lungs).
I skimmed through hundreds of books, websites, articles and reviews putting each resource to the standard of science. Were the methods the author advocates based on the scientific method (repeatable double blind studies, etc.) or was it based on anecdotes? With this in mind I began to filter out and accumulate what I considered the best of what I found. Much of what I found I had to put in a big stack with a large question mark over it. Some of the material in that stack may be good, but we don't have time to use my wife as a guinea pig on the thousands of different options in that mountain of information.
I found a lot of good material, but I don't want to overwhelm you with a long reading list. I'm assuming that you, or someone you know or love has been (or may be) diagnosed with cancer and there is little time to waste.
After all of my searching if I had to recommend only one book and complementary websites to lay a foundation for anyone battling cancer it would be Life Over Cancer by Dr. Keith I. Block. The related websites are:
1. www.blockmd.com (website for The Block Center for Integrative Cancer Treatment)
2. www.lifeovercancer (website for Life Over Cancer with updates on new research constantly coming to light)
Here are the three main reasons why:
First, the current edition of Life Over Cancer contains positive reviews by sixteen doctors and professionals in the field of cancer treatment and research. The reviewer on the cover is by Robert Newman, Ph.D., Professor of Experimental Therapeutics at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center which is considered by many oncologists to be one of the top three cancer treatment centers in the United States. In short Dr. Block's methods are thoroughly peer reviewed and have a strong foundation in science.
Second, [Dr. Block is a leader in the field of integrative oncology, and founded the Block Center for Integrative Cancer Treatement in Skokie, IL over 30 years ago. He and the Center have treated over 15,000 cancer patients.]
Third, doctors such as the renowned Andrew Weil, M.D. consider Dr. Block the leading pioneer in the field of integrative cancer care. In his introduction to Life Over Cancer, Dr. Weil describes the integrative approach and its benefits:
"By judiciously combining conventional treatments with natural agents, fitness regimens, stress care strategies, and other noninvasive modalities, Dr. Block believes--and his clinical work demonstrates--that people with cancer can realize optimal health, a better quality of life, and lifelong remissions.
"Dr. Block has developed an essential profiling system to individualize treatments in order to counter the tumor's unique molecular fingerprint, while making the microenvironment inhospitable to future cancer growth." (All bold italics in quote are mine.)
Many oncologists and other medical professionals consider integrative cancer care to be the future of cancer treatment.
One of the saddest situations I repeatedly saw in accompanying my wife on her journey with cancer is a disturbing number of cancer patients who were facing their second, third, fourth, fifth and--in one case that stands out in my mind--sixth bout with cancer. This, and my research, drove home the point that unless the underlying biochemical causes that encouraged the cancer in the first place are changed to make the body "inhospitable to future cancer growth" it increases the likelihood of recurrence and may hinder the effectiveness of conventional treatment.
It's my heart felt wish to spare as many people as possible of as much suffering as possible in battling this challenging disease. Please forward this review to any friends or family that are battling cancer and may benefit by researching Dr. Block's work.
I wish you and your family wellness as we leave this challenging year and enter the new one,
Carl Borja Nelson
We wish you all a healthy and hopeful new year!
For more information on The Block Center for Integrative Cancer Treatment, visit BlockMD.com.
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