Jan

17

Afraid of Their Own Medicine

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In one survey, most oncologists specializing in lung cancer reported that they would not take chemotherapy if they had the disease. Yet, everyday these doctors give their patients chemotherapy.

In conversation with an investigative reporter, one brain cancer specialist admitted that he would never submit to radiation if he had a brain tumor. Nevertheless, he continues to send patients for radiation, because he would be kicked out of the hospital if he didn’t follow the accepted protocol.

Based on information in: Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients, Jan 1998; Spectrum, Mar/April 1998

William Campbell Douglass II, MD - “To understand the utter hypocrisy of chemotherapy, consider the following: The McGill Cancer Center in Canada, one of the largest and most prestigious cancer treatment centers in the world, did a study of oncologists to determine how they would respond to a diagnosis of cancer.

On the confidential questionnaire, 58 out of 64 doctors said that all chemotherapy programs were unacceptable to them and their family members. The overriding reason for this decision was that the drugs are ineffective and have an unacceptable degree of toxicity. These are the same doctors who will tell you that their chemotherapy treatments will shrink your tumor and prolong your life!”

Jan

16

No Rights for a Child - Part 5

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CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS POST

-1985-
Oncologists admit that chemo is ineffective: A year later, after trying out all the various chemo drugs on children, a group of pediatric oncologists admit that the role of chemotherapy is “unclear, ” that “responses are generally transient,” and “virtually no cures are reported.” They also admit again that an “active” drug (a drug that may temporarily shrink a tumor) has no relationship to a cure.

-1987-
Oncologists admit that chemo is ineffective and increases the risk of infection: “The (survival) rate was not improved by the chemotherapy program. An increased risk of infection was associated with the chemotherapy.”
- Jenkin RD, Boesel C, Ertel I, Evans A, Hittle R, Ortega J, Sposto R, Wara W, Wilson C, Anderson J, et al. Brain-stem tumors in childhood: a prospective randomized trial of irradiation with and without adjuvant CCNU, VCR, and prednisone. A report of the Children’s Cancer Study Group. J Neurosurg 1987 Feb; 66(2): 227-33.

The fact that chemotherapy actually causes cancer should be of no surprise to the oncologists. The chemotherapy they gave Alexander and thousands of other children is listed as “Known Human Carcinogens” by the National Institute of Health, the National Cancer Institute and the FDA.

In fact, cyclophosphamide was listed as a “Known Human Carcinogen” by the First Annual Report on Carcinogens published by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in 1980. In addition, there are four other chemotherapy compounds on that list.

Furthermore, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer lists ten chemotherapy agents including cyclophosphamide and all alkylating agents as “Materials known to be carcinogenic to humans.”
It is hard to believe that oncologists would be injecting known human carcinogens into children with cancer. But, that is exactly what they are doing. They should not feign surprise when the children begin developing secondary cancers.

This is what happened to Alexander. His first cancer was medulloblastoma. After three months of chemotherapy the cancer returned as 30 separate tumors. At that point the doctors called it “leptomeningeal sarcoma.”

-1991-
Chemo leads to destruction of hearing, infertility and secondary cancers.

- Complications of chemotherapy include,“permanent hearing impairment secondary to cisplatin, infertility and an increased risk of second primary neoplasms.”
- Allen JC: Complications of chemotherapy in patients with brain and spinal cord tumors. Pediatr Neurosurg 1991-92; 17(4): 218-24

-1993-
The chemo is not the problem, it’s the children who are at fault: It’s 1993 and the oncologists have a new strategy - blame the victim. The drugs are exactly the same. Now, the problem isn’t that the chemotherapy is worthless. The problem is the children. They just have a poor prognosis.

“Children younger than 5 years who have PNET have a poor prognosis.”
- Goldwein JW, Radcliffe J, Packer RJ, Sutton LN, Lange B, Rorke LB, D’Angio GJ. Results of a pilot study of low-dose craniospinal radiation therapy plus chemotherapy for children younger than 5 years with primitive neuroectodermal tumors. Cancer 1993 Apr 15; 71(8): 2647-52.

- Today, according to the oncologists, children on chemotherapy have their brain cancers return in an average of 5-7 months. With chemo, Alexander lived a little more than five months from when he was diagnosed and he had all his tumor removed.

- Incredibly, the children operated on 70 and 80 years ago already beat Alexander in terms of survival, but if these kids had had the benefit of a modern surgery they might have lived even longer. Who knows how long these children would have lived if they had been given a modern operation?

- This suggested that chemotherapy was shortening children’s lives, not lengthening them!

-1998-
But even after these admissions that “virtually no cures are reported” with chemo in 1985, that chemo is “controversial” in 1991, “unproven” in 1993, and provides “a poor rate of survival and high treatment associated morbidity (i.e. side effects)” in 1997, nothing changes.

Here we are in 1998. The children are still getting the same drugs. The children die of the disease or the chemo itself. The conclusion is that the treatment doesn’t work. How many dead children did it take to reach that conclusion? What’s worse is that even with that conclusion, the oncologists continue to use these drugs on children….

THE END

Jan

15

No Rights for a Child - Part 4

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CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS POST

- What you are about to read will shock you. It is a story of oncologists lying to parents and the public about the efficacy of their therapy. The quotations that follow come from abstracts and articles printed in their peer reviewed medical journals that trace the use of these drugs in children starting almost a quarter of a century ago. It is organized in chronological order. Incredibly, all these drugs are still being administered to children in hospitals throughout the country, sometimes without the parents’ consent.

Alexander was put on protocol CCG 9921 that consists of:
- Vincristine
- Cyclophosphamide
- Cisplatin (very similar to Carboplatin)
- Etoposide (also called VP 16)

- 1976 -
Vincristine causes seizures: In 1976, the oncologists experiment on children with a drug called vincristine. Twenty-two years later, they would administer the same drug to Alexander. Here in 1976 they find that the drug causes seizures.

-1978-
Vincristine does not eliminate cancer: A year later, they tested vincristine with two other chemotherapy drugs on more children. The tumors returned in an average of 45 weeks with the chemo.

-1982-
Vincristine destroys eyesight: The fact that oncologists were already warned that vincristine was dangerous to a child’s eyesight didn’t seem to make an impression. It didn’t for Alexander’s oncologist in 1998. This article is written about another child who nearly goes blind from vincristine in 1982.

-1983-
Cisplatin destroys hearing and leads to neurologic deterioration: In 1983, the danger of another chemo drug, cisplatin, is discovered, but only after trying it out on children. This is another drug the oncologists would inject into Alexander fifteen years later.

- “Six children received cisplatin for recurrent brain tumor. Five of the six children had evidence of significant hearing loss after only one cycle of treatment. Two (children)…developed profound deterioration in neurologic status within 72 hours after infusion.” - Granowetter L, Rosenstock JG, Packer RJ: Enhanced cis-platinum neurotoxity in pediatric patients with brain tumors. J Neurooncol 1983; 1(4):293-7.

- Cyclophosphamide does not affect survival: That same year, another chemotherapy drug called cyclophosphamide is tried out on children. It does not effect survival. This is the third of four drugs they would administer to Alexander many years later. This article admits that even if a drug is “active” and temporarily shrinks a tumor, it does not prolong life.

- “A case of fatal myeloencephalopathy (inflammation of the spinal chord and brain) secondary to accidental intrathecal administration of vincristine is reported in a 16 year old boy. He underwent a progressive ascending chemical meningoencephalitis leading to coma, and died 36 days after the injection. At autopsy, all regions of the brain that had been in direct contact with the cerebrospinal fluid were necrotic (dead).”

“Gonadal function was studied in two groups of children previously treated for medulloblastoma…In group one, but not in group two, the children also received adjuvant chemotherapy (BCNU or CCNU plus vincristine in four and procarbazine in three patients). The nine children in group one showed clinical and biochemical evidence of gonadal damage… In group two, each child…(developed) normally…We conclude that nitrosoureas (chemotherapy) was responsible for the gonadal damage…”
- Ahmed SR, Shalet SM, Campbell RH, Deakin DP. Primary gonadal damage following treatment of brain tumors in childhood. J Pediatr 1983 Oct; 103(4): 562-5.

-1984-
Oncologists may not count dead children in their statistics: The next year, several chemo drugs including vincristine, and etoposide, are administered to children in another chemo experiment. Etoposide is the fourth and last drug in the chemo cocktail they would administer to Alexander fourteen years later.

TO BE CONTINUE

Jan

14

No Rights for a Child - Part 3

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CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS POST

The following quotes are taken verbatim from Alexander’s medical chart. Each entry is written by Hyder.

September 25, 1998
Mr. and Mrs. Horwin and I discussed treatment options in the office for about two hours…We discussed the risks of chemotherapy at length including low hemoglobin, low white blood cells, low platelets, infection, need for blood transfusion, need for platelet transfusion, pain, nausea, vomiting, hair loss, skin injury, heart damage, lung damage, liver damage, kidney damage, loss of hearing, small stature, hormonal problems such as low growth hormone or low thyroid hormone, infertility, second cancer, intellectual decline, worsening of neurological symptoms, ineffectiveness, and death. Mr. and Mrs. Horwin were quite distressed by all the potential side effects, but I explained that despite all these risks, I believe the potential benefits of chemotherapy in prolonging the length of cancer free survival or possibly cure are greater than the potential risks.

October 2, 1998
…without chemotherapy I am quite certain that the disease will relapse and this could possibly result in Alexander’s death. PLANS: We will proceed with chemotherapy like CCG-9921A, as the best available therapy.

October 3, 1998
I received your voice mail message that you have decided not to bring Alexander for scheduled chemotherapy today…Alexander needs chemotherapy now…We need to get chemotherapy started if Alexander is to survive this disease.

October 6, 1998
“About 4:30 p.m. on October 5, 1998, Mr. Horwin telephoned and asked me about a variety of biological therapies such as “nerve cell growth factor,” “retinoic acid,” and “tumor necrosis factor”…Mr. Horwin asked to use these biological therapies for his son before chemotherapy. I again told him clearly in my professional opinion, chemotherapy is the next treatment to use because of its known clinical efficacy.

He was distressed by the limitations of chemotherapy, since treatment is successful in only about 30-40% of children with Alexander’s type of cancer…I explained that the best opportunity we have to successfully treat Alexander’s cancer is to use chemotherapy now…I reiterated that my best professional advice which is to use chemotherapy now against Alexander’s cancer. I spoke to Mrs. Horwin and explained what I had explained to her husband. I told her that my best medical advice is to use chemotherapy for treatment of Alexander’s cancer. I told her that without chemotherapy, Alexander may die from cancer…”

- We began to research “leptomeningeal sarcoma” the cancer that had grown so rapidly and killed him. One of the abstracts that came back stunned us.

- It was a study published in 1994 by Dr. Heideman, the oncologist we had met at St. Judes Children’s Research Hospital. It discussed the “leptomeningeal progression” of medulloblastoma in thirteen children Alexander’s age who were given chemotherapy. It explained how the cancers returned and spread in eleven of the thirteen children within five months.

- It mentioned that for some of the children the cancers grew in the spines. Incredibly, this abstract described in detail exactly what happened to our son. But even more astounding, the abstract explained that this protocol was terminated due to the poor performance of the drugs.

- The chemo that they had given these children was identical to the chemo Hyder had administered to Alexander. The four drugs were exactly the same - vincristine, cisplatin, cyclophosphamide and etoposide. The cancer that returned, metastasized and took Alexander’s life did so in less than five months from the time when he had his surgeries

TO BE CONTINUE

Jan

13

No Rights for a Child - Part 2

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CONTINUE FROM PREVIOUS POST

- The oncologists warned us that if we didn’t use chemotherapy that the tumor would probably return in three months. These doctors assured us that the chemo they were administering to our son was the current “state-of-the-art.” They told us repeatedly that this was Alexander’s best choice for a long and healthy life.

- We continued the chemotherapy. As a result of the drugs, Alexander’s balance was lost, his ability to see deteriorated, and he lost hearing in one ear. The whole thing was horrendous.

- After a “clean” MRI on January 4th, Alexander had a spinal tap. A day later Alexander complained of pain in his head and back and he began to vomit. We asked for another MRI but Hyder, the oncolgist, refused because he had done one just a few days previously. Hyder told us that Alexander’s pain was just a side effect of the spinal tap. But as each day passed the pain became worse.

- We brought Alexander into the hospital on January 11th and Hyder ordered a CAT scan without contrast. We were told that the scan looked “fine,” although later, we would find out that a CAT scan especially one taken without contrast is not designed to reveal the presence of a returning brain tumor.

- Finally, on January 18th, we brought Alexander into the hospital and demanded a MRI. Hyder refused to order the test. He explained that it was too late in the day to schedule one. We had a confrontation. We would not leave until a MRI was ordered. Finally, Hyder relented. Alexander was wheeled into the MRI suite.

- An hour later we had the news, Hyder shook his head and told us that Alexander had over 30 tumors throughout his brain and spine. “What does that mean?” we asked completely stunned. Hyder just continued to shake his head.

“What is it?” we asked him. “Leptomeningeal sarcoma. I am so sorry. There is nothing we can do.” “How is this possible?” “It happens,” he said. “How often,” we asked. “It happens sometimes. I’m so sorry.” How long does Alexander have,” we asked. The surgeon paused. “A few days, perhaps,” he said.

“The only thing we can do is send you home with hospice care. I’ll give you a prescription for morphine and decadron,” Hyder said as he awkwardly patted me on the shoulder. “I think it is better to keep your son here tonight and you can go home tomorrow,” he added.

Alexander died on January 31st, 1999 in his mommy’s arms. Our son was only 2 ½ years old. After Alexander was buried, Raphaele and I wanted to know what happened. No one ever told us that the cancer could come back and kill Alexander while he was on chemotherapy. In fact, Alexander was only one quarter through a twelve-month chemo protocol (comprised of induction and maintenance chemotherapy).

TO BE CONTINUED

Jan

12

No Rights for a Child

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(a true story by parents Raphaele & Michael Horwin)


Over forty years ago, those powerful words were written and endorsed by many nations throughout the world including the United States. It is a beautiful declaration but sadly it is only an illusion. The medical establishment took every single one of those rights away from our only child Alexander. Without the right to live, there are no opportunities for affection, play, or love.

Alexander was two years old when he was diagnosed with medulloblastoma, the most common pediatric brain tumor. This cancer is rising in frequency.

After the first round of chemo, Alexander began to change. Even after two brain operations, Alexander was still a vibrant, ruddy, strong, energetic child. But as the chemotherapy repeatedly filled his small body Alexander began to die inside.

- First the relentless stomach pains and the horrendous projectile vomiting began. Then his beautiful curly hair fell out. Next his dark skin tone turned pale as a ghost. He got sick with fevers and spent weeks in the hospital.

- Then there were the blood transfusions to replace the blood cells the chemo had killed, the hearing tests to see if the chemo drug cisplatin had not devastated too much of his hearing, the nuclear medicine tests to check if his kidneys were not giving up under the strain of processing so much poison, the liver function tests to ensure that his liver was not being destroyed, etc.

- During chemotherapy we had to squeeze an antibiotic into his nose called nystatin several times a day. He hated it and buried his face in a pillow when he saw it coming with all the strength his little body could muster. One of us had to pin Alexander down and keep his head immobile while the other pushed the syringe into each nostril and injected the solution. We were also called upon to give him GCSF injections at home.

- Then we found the following statement written by Hyder in our son’s medical chart. It was dated September 26, 1998:
“Dr. Heideman also called me because he was very concerned about Mr. and Mrs. Horwin…He was very concerned that the family would refuse treatment and that a court order would have to be obtained to treat Alexander.”

- And on October 6, 1998 Hyder continued:
“I think that if Mr. and Mrs. Horwin do not bring Alexander in for chemotherapy tomorrow, additional steps will be necessary.”

- We went to see an attorney to find out if the oncologists could take Alexander from us if we decided to stop chemo. Incredibly, the answer was yes !.

(TO BE CONTINUED)