Before using alternative or complementary cancer treatments for Colorectal Cancer, whether artemisinin, off-label drugs such as metformin, or treatments such as oncothermia, immunotherapy or the Nanoknife, it is important to understand the issues behind the disease, such as sugar control, poor diet, microbiome imbalance, pathogens and inflammation.
1. Sugar drives Colorectal Cancer
Common sugar (glucose; high fructose corn syrup, even lactose) is your enemy! Johns Hopkins produced their research on how Colorectal cancer 'needed its sugar fix' in 2009.
So the first thing to do is employ a diet which restricts sugar - it could be an Atkins Diet or a Ketogenic Diet - but both encourage higher levels of blood fat, which is known to spread colorectal cancer.
We prefer a Rainbow Diet supported by Metformin or Berberine.
2. A damaged microbiome always lies behind CRC
This could be from drugs, antibiotics, food poisoning, stress and more.
People with Colorectal cancer have lost good bacterial strains like the Clostridium strain that metabolises excess sugar for you, and gained bad yeasts, possibly a parasite, but definitely pathogens like Fusobacterium and probably E coli. There have even been higher levels of HPV detected in CRC.
So it would be a good idea to kill the yeasts, pathogens and any parasites as they are making toxins day in, day out which drive your cancer.
3. Chronic inflammation in the gut can drive Colorectal cancer.
Chronic inflammation can be caused by having pathogens, yeasts or parasites producing toxins in the gut. But it can also be caused by turning on an enzyme called COX-2. This produces localised inflammatory hormones. One of the effects is that this can cause the growth of polyps which can lead to cancer. Secondary bile acids formed by eating saturated fat can also turn on COX-2. This inflammation can lead to Colorectal cancer.
Healthy Gut bacteria produce a short chain ester called sodium butyrate which kills colorectal cancer cells in the gut when they form
A little dairy can help control the inflammation. Omega 3 from fish oils has been shown to control inflammation and restrict polyp formation and growth.
Vitamin D controls inflammation in the gut, and 79% of people diagnosed with colorectal cancer have low vitamin D (below 20 ng/ml). Vitamin D is the sunshine vitamin. If you correct the low levels you will live longer. Fact.
Unfortunately the drugs used in CRC usually wreck your levels of vitamin D, so take a double dose (around 10,000 IUs a day).
4. Chemotherapy drugs can make matters worse
It seems odd that when it has been shown that a major driving force behind Colorectal Cancer is a compromised microbiome, that oncologists feel the only way to beat the disease is to kill cancer cells while making an already imperfect gut microbiome considerably worse.
Standard treatments include FOLFOX and FOLFIRI.
The first F stands for 5-FU, a 1956 approved chemo agent that kills anything that divides at a rapid rate.
Worse, in America oncologists are clear that excess of 5-FU has to be mopped up by an enzyme in the liver called DPD. Their viiew is that 5% of the population has no DPD, while further 15% have it in short supply. They have a test. In the UK, this is pretty much ignored. However, producing no DPD (in a liver that might already be compromised) can kill you if 5-FU builds up in the body.
5. How to make your Chemotherapy work better and reduce side-effects
There is a lot you can do to improve your drug effectiveness and restrict side-effects
Hyperbaric oxygen, hyperthermia are good, as is fasting - then, curcumin, melatonin, honokiol and berberine are cancer attacking supplements with multiple further benefits. Magnesium supplementation is essential as chemo can drain the body. And you should always take a yeast killer like oregano oil, while on chemo to stop them building in the body and making you fatigued.
6. Liver and lung mets - surgery alternative
Often the surgeon may just cut away a piece of the liver which contains cancer tumours, with a comment such as 'The liver regenerates itself'. Yes, it can do when you are a child. It's not so common when you are 50. From the outset you should protect your liver - magnesium, milk thistle and vitamin K2 can help.
If surgery is required, for the liver, our for 'lung nodules' are their alternatives? Increasingly the doctor will suggest RadioFrequency Ablation (RFA) or Microwave ablation where a needle is inserted through the skin using ultrasound guidance into the liver tumour and the tumour is destroyed by heat. A friend with CRC has just had 27 lung nodules dealt with in this way.
Another increasingly used treatment is the Nanoknife IRE, where a needle is placed either side of the tumour and an electrical current passed between the needles punches nano holes in the cancer cell walls. The Nanoknife was created for hard to reach, inoperable cancers.
7. Immunotherapy and Colorectal Cancer
This is a relatively new area. Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) has now received approval for advanced Colorectal cancer. The number of people showing full remission was however modest. Nivolumab (Opdivo) performs similarly.
An interesting alternative might be Low Dose Naltrexone, or LDN. Naltrexone is a drug used for mental probles and addictions at 300 mg. But when used in low doses - from 0.5 to 4.5 - and especially when pulsed for 3 days on and 3 days off, boosts the immune system better than any immunotherapy according to an American and a Canadian Professor. It is taken with vitamin D and alpha lipoic acid
8. Off-label drugs and Colorectal Cancer
Low Dose Naltrexone is an example of a repurposed drug - a drug approved for one use, but finding favour through research studies with cancer. Obviously, these drugs have been around for quite some time and so their side-effects are well known and usually minimal.
Other drugs that have benefits with Colorectal Cancer. Above we talked about Metformin, Atorvastatin and Cimetidine.
But Celebrex, Dipyridamole, Fenbendazole, Niclosamide and Propranolol each has research showing benefits with colorectal cancer.
You should start with our overview
9. Oncothermia and Colorectal Cancer secordaries
Where the cancer has gone to other organs and, especially, the bones,there is a treatment called oncothermia - it is approved by the NHS in Canada, and is available in the UK and Germany. It uses electrical field energy and hyperthermia to attack tumours. They can be reduced by 95% which means the treatment will have to be repeated after three years or so. The patient lies on the lower plate, and a second smaller plate is positioned above the tumour. The treatment is painless.
10. Cannabis and Cannabinoids in colorectal cancer
To date there is only limited research on the anticancer effects of cannabis with Colorectal cancer. One study showed that CBD could reduce the spread of colorectal cancer in mice. A second study showed that CBD could reduce carcinogenesis and stop the spread of colorectal cancer in mice.
There is research showing cannabis and CBD both reduce pain and nausea in cancer patients. Another study showed that CBD could stop a protein called ID-1 that makes cancers become aggressive.
People with Colorectal cancer have been known to take LDN (3 days on and 3 days off) plus a little cannabis before bed, and CBD oil (60% minimum) in the morning. It is a combination that seems to enhance pain relief and calm the body.
Complementary and Alternative Therapies in Colorectal Cancer
Obviously many of the above 'alternative' colorectal cancer treatments can be used with the oncologist's programme to form part of a 'Complementary and Integrative Medicine' programme for your cancer. CIM as it is called, is the way forward in treating cancer.