CHEMO AND BOTANICALS: A SUPERIOR COMBINATION by Harry Chrissakis, Herbalist, M.H., Natural Healing
HERBALIST AND HERBS
In alternative medicine, the idea of using Natural Medicine with chemo is limited almost exclusively to protecting the body against the short and long term damaging side effects of the chemo. This is a very limited view of Natural Medicine based upon a very fractured physiologic model. Much can be done before, during and after chemo to directly impact the cancer with the use of Natural Medicine. As I have stated in previous articles, much more homework is required if we want to increase our success rates with chemo. Combining Natural Medicine with chemo has a great deal to offer the cancer patient.
A few things that this article is aiming at is
1. Getting the right drug to the person
2. Reducing side effect
3. With proper application of natural medicine, there is the very real possibility of reducing amounts and frequency of dose of these very toxic and very useful medicines.
4. Reduce and or eliminate multi-drug resistance
5. Managing Cancer, not necessarily eliminating it.
Now let’s watch a short video:
Let’s take one of the tenets of natural medicine and apply it to cancer. Strengthen the patient and weaken the cancer. One of the many things natural medicine can do for the cancer patient is to strengthen core energy. Anytime you bring a person’s body closer to balance, you take ground from the disease. Adaptogens normalize function, communication and coordination within the central nervous system and the central hormonal axis. Cancer is a disease based on allostatic breakdown. The control systems that guide cell behavior have become dysfunctional. Cancer cells are dependent upon getting excessive growth signals. These growth factors not only push the cancer, but also prevent it from dying as a normal cell would. They also help induce Multi Drug resistance. Adaptogenic herbs normalize these aberrant processes, stopping the growth signals, helping to induce cancer cell suicide, and reduce or eliminate multi drug resistance. These herbs can be taken for a period before the chemo and during it and forever after it. They do not negatively impact the cytotoxic effect of the chemo. If anything, they enhance it and reduce collateral damage.
I am going to profile a group of chemotherapeutic agents, that are commonly used, called Taxanes. Taxanes are derivatives of the yew tree ( approximately 60% of chemo agents were or are of plant origin ). In order to determine if this person fits this drug, many more things have to be done than are presently being done.
If there was a surgery and a tumor was removed, a section of that fresh tumor tissue could be sent to a lab that specializes in testing chemo agents against that cancer tissue. From this we can determine which drugs could be effective. This idea really works and is rarely implemented
A test for SNP’s could yield information that can determine if this person can both metabolize and eliminate this drug from there system properly. Again this is a critical piece of information. If you cannot use or get rid of the drug, consequences can be dire.
Through genomic testing, it can be determined who is at risk for recurrence and therefore would need more aggressive treatment upfront.
Tumor Analysis: Molecular Profiling: Biomarker Analysis. These tests can determine which growth factors/amplified receptors are driving the cancer and possibly inducing multi-drug resistance ( one of the major problems in chemotherapy use )
Any or all of these tests are rarely done
Along with these tests, there is a group of specific markers to help determine if Taxanes will work for this person.
P53 is a gene site that acts as the guardian of the genome. It is mutated in over 50% of all cancers. P53 positive is a green light for Taxane use. P53 is rarely tested.
In order for some chemo agents to work well , cancer cell division has to be relatively rapid. A Ki 67 above 10% in ER+ is a positive sign for Taxane use.
Some other references for taxane use are Low Class 3 beta Tubulin, Her II neu positive, EGFR positive, bFGF negitive
Along with these tests other front line tests need to be given. CBC, Metabolic, Lipid, Complete Hormone Panel, Complete Thyroid Panel, C-Reactive Protein, Homocystiene, D-Dimer, Insulin, C-Peptide, Fibrinogen, and Cancer Markers such as 27-29 for breast cancer.
A great difficulty in cancer testing is that only certain cancers get certain tests. One obvious example is Breast and Prostate Cancer. We only check for estrogen receptivity on Breast Cancer. The prostate has estrogen receptors and many overweight men run high amounts of estrogen and if they have prostate cancer, that same estrogen will act as a driver. How could we know this without the proper testing?
All this and more, just to figure out which drug could be a better fit. Now enter botanicals. Botanical medicine combined with chemotherapy is superior to chemo alone. Although it is true that plant medicines do not have the killing power that chemo does, they do have the capacity to reduce multi-drug resistance, slow down cancer proliferation, reduce angiogenesis, induce programmed cell suicide of cancer cells selectively, bring down inflammation and reduce oxidative damage, normalize cell to cell communication, rebalance hormonal response , including stress response, balance blood glucose and insulin. I can keep going, but let’s go back to Taxanes to see how botanicals, and some supplements, can assist and improve chemotherapy. Here is a short list of botanicals that combine well with Taxanes. Curcumin, Aswaganda, Panax Ginseng, Magnolia, Knot weed.
Paclitaxel is a taxane in common use. Aswaganda will increase the tumorcidal effect of paclitaxel in lung cancer and will help prevent bone marrow suppression. Panax ginseng will prevent Natural Killer cell depression during paclitaxel use. Ginseng will also increase the penetration and activity of macrophages on cancer cells and reduce MDR( Multi-Drug-Resistance).When used with Paclitaxel, the supplement DIM will help induce cell cycle arrest (slow or stop cell division ) in cancer cells and helps to reduce Her II neu resistance in breast cancer, which in turn will help reduce resistance to the Herceptin. Japanese Knotweed (Resveratrol)used with Taxol, inhibits TNF-a , MMP-9 (cancer cell proliferation and invasion), helps induce cancer cell death and reduces inflammation by inhibiting COX 2, all of which are major driving forces in the evolution of cancer. Resveratrol is also synergistic with Doxorubicin and Tamoxifen in breast cancer. It also increases Taxol’s ability to induce cancer cell suicide by reducing Bcl2 and increasing PTEN (reducing MDR and aberrant cell division). Many of the drugs, used the way they currently are, will actually induce inflammation (which is a very pro cancer event). Many of the herbs prevent that from happening or reduce it dramatically, by stabilizing inflammatory pathways, (specifically NFKb and COX 2).
HER II neu + breast cancer constitutes about 30% of diagnosed breast cancer . Her II acts as a driver of breast cancer, and it also helps induce MDR. Herceptin is the drug of choice to work with HER II +. Herceptin has a limited window of use before resistance to the drug is acquired. Botanicals both reduce HER II and maintain HER II receptive to the Herceptin. The drug works better and longer with less resistance when used with botanicals. Both Reishi mushroom and Green Tea Extract synergise with Herceptin.
Alkylating agents are chemo agents that damage DNA bases and induce cross linking of protein structures inside the cell, ultimately destroying the cell. They are often platinum based ( Cisplatin, Carboplatin, ). Crt1 is a copper transport protein. If elevated, Crt1 will contribute to resistance to platinum drugs. The same is true of BcL2. Both of these markers can be reduced through natural medicine. If a receptor called CHFR has been damaged through the process of methylation, than this would be considered a negative sign for the use of Cisplatin. Alkylating agents are very hard on 2 areas; Bone marrow suppression and the nervous system (inducing neuropathy) . Natural Medicine can be of great assistance in these 2 areas.
The examples I have given are abridged: there is a great deal more that can be done and there are many more examples of combining chemo and natural medicine.
To be successful with the use of Natural Medicine: quality of products, frequency and amount of dose is critical.
Harry Chrissakis, Herbalist, M.H., Natural Medicine
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