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Studies indicate that some Herbal Supplements are relatively safe and as effective as prescription drugs for Alzheimer’s or Dementia patients. Since they are actually being recognized as drugs by the authorities it would make sense to treat them as such. It would also make sense to seek out a knowledgeable Integrative Medicine physician who has training in herbs and nutritional treatments.

After a person has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease or non-Alzheimer’s dementia he or she and their loved ones may feel desperate and frustrated with their physician’s recommendations. Dietary supplements are an interesting option or add on to medications and may offer hope for individuals and families. However, consider all of the facts before trying one of these treatments and seek reliable information. Any drug or herb has benefits or risks attached and in combining them their can be possible interactions as well.

The Integrative Medicine Approach

Since herbs, vitamins, antioxidants and fatty acids etc. are increasingly being studied for their potential benefit to patients it would make sense to go to physicians with training in this area. If you want cosmetic surgery you aren’t going to seek out a physician who doesn’t have any training in this area. Therefore you cannot rely on the advice of any physician who hasn’t had training with nutritional approaches and in fact may be biased against non-drug treatments. He/she may be unaware of the up to date scientific information which has shown herbs and nutrients to be helpful for brain disorders.

The type of physician that you should seek out is an Integrative Medicine physician. These physicians use a blended approach to healthcare, combining Conventional Medicine with appropriate Complementary and Alternative Medicines. This approach has proven to be safe and effective for a number of medical conditions. Taking over the counter herbal products without the advice of these experts could cause problems though.

A study in the Jan-Feb 2005 American Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease found - “Results show that the integrative treatment not only protracted [prolonged] cognitive decline for 24 months but even improved cognition, especially memory and frontal lobe functions.”

The American Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease and Other Dementias of Mar-Apr 2006 stated – “Although some Food and Drug Administration-approved drugs are available for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, the outcomes are often unsatisfactory, and there is a place for alternative medicine, in particular, herbal medicine.”

What does the Scientific Medical Literature say about herbs?

Let’s look at the two most studied herbs with the best available information here, because there is a lot of scare mongering about the effectiveness and safety of herbal therapies.

Gingko Biloba is it an Herb or Drug?

Recent studies have shown positive results with a specially formed Ginkgo formula. The European Journal of Neurology in September 2006 reported in a randomized placebo-controlled double-blind study that Ginkgo was as effective as the drug donepezil.

In fact the herb Ginkgo biloba is sold and regulated as a drug in Germany. This means that it should be treated as a drug and used with caution when combined with medications such as aspirin and other anticoagulant drugs and under the guidance of a physician.

Galantamine is it a Drug or an Herb?

The British Medical Journal (BMJ) in December of 2000, reported that galantamine appears to slow the decline in both cognition and functional ability in Alzheimer’s patients. This was a large 653 study from 86 clinics, with patients suffering from mild to moderate disease.

Interestingly, if herbs are as ineffective as critics say then why has this herb been granted FDA approval for sale as a prescription drug under the brand name Razadyne (formerly Reminyl). It is ironic that galantamine with over a 50 year history of use as a natural herbal product, from the snowdrop plant, is recognized as a drug but is still available without a prescription.

In fact the drug Razadyne (Galantamine) is an herb. The drug is exactly the same as the herbal extract except for the price, naturally, pun intended.

Before adding any supplements to Alzheimer’s or dementia treatment plans, consult with an Integrative Medicine physician to make sure it’s safe, right for you and won’t interfere with any other medications. There are other promising herbs these physicians will be aware of to inform you about. Ask questions so you have a realistic expectation of what supplements can achieve as there is no cure, however you can enjoy a better quality of life.

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About the Author

Dennis Cutforth is a researcher and writer with over 35 years experience in health-care sales, marketing and research in pharmaceuticals and natural health. Dennis will cut through all the propaganda and give you the real facts about what really works to make you healthier and happier. Visit his website Get A Better Life Today.

A new study published February 28, 2007 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) contends vitamins are dangerous and even cause death. Is this really so? Not to the experienced researcher who knows the scientific literature and doesn’t have a bias against non-drug treatments or a hidden agenda.

The authors used what has been called a ‘gold standard’ for studies, that is meta-analysis (pooling of studies) to get larger numbers to presumably give better statistical significance and a better understanding of results. But, not if you have an agenda and are looking to smear a competitors product, a la a political candidate. This is marketing 101 for politicians. Now why on earth would so-called scientists try to smear vitamins? What have these innocent inexpensive safe and effective nutrients done to them for this action to be taken?

Well they would save the U.S. economy (read losses for Big Pharma, Major News Media and Medical Establishment) $58 billion dollars per year if everyone took 1 multivitamin per day alone. This is according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) State-of-the-Science Conference on Multivitamin/Mineral Supplements and Chronic Disease Prevention. May 15–17, 2006.

So Scientists, ‘Show Me The Science’!

Here in a nutshell is what these Danish Scientists (if I may use that term loosely) did in the JAMA study.

They selected 68 out of 815 clinical trials with 232,606 patients and pooled then to form a large-scale study to look into the benefits of vitamins. They concluded that when the antioxidant supplements were taken separately, beta carotene increased death rates by 7 per cent, vitamin A by 16 per cent, and vitamin E by 4 per cent.

The Major News Media were all over this with headlines like – Vitamins Kill! And surprise, surprise the authors suggested – “that money spent on vitamin supplements is wasted.” Gee, I’ve heard that one before; they should have added that with the money saved on vitamins and your nutritionally deficient body in need of repair, that you’d have more money left over to buy expensive prescription drugs.

So what they did really was compare apples to oranges. Or another analogy would be that they compared — hockey to basketball to baseball to football and concluded that exercise is dangerous for your health. Common sense says that exercise is good for you, and so are vitamins. Walking down the street is dangerous for goodness sake. These authors strain credulity. But is it science? I’d have to say ‘There is something rotten in Denmark!’

Scaremongering and Medicine

Let’s look at the methodology of the authors, from an article by Ed Edelson of HealthDay who reported that the JAMA study “drew quick criticism from one independent expert.”
“One of the major premises of doing such a meta-analysis is that the studies should be comparable,” said Jeffrey Blumberg, director of the Antioxidants Research Laboratory at Tufts University in Boston. “Here, they looked at primary prevention, treatment, old people, young people, smokers, nonsmokers. Only when they used their own criteria of what was good and what was bad were they able to show an increase in all-cause mortality.”

“You don’t see people dropping dead right and left from overdoses of antioxidant supplements,” Blumberg said. “It is just not happening. You have to explain to me how some essential nutrients kill you in a couple of years.”

Antioxidant supplements “have been shown in a number of studies to have no adverse effects,” Blumberg said. “They are not toxic, but evidence that they prevent heart disease and cancer is equivocal (susceptible of double interpretation).”

It is scaremongering to say vitamins are dangerous based on flawed data when scientists use “their own criteria” and or “body English” (as another physician put it) to achieve the outcome they wanted.

“Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics.” - Mark Twain

A similar study a few years ago by Johns Hopkins that analyzed 19 clinical trials, concluded that 400 or more international units (IU) of vitamin E per day increased the risk of dying from all causes by about four per cent. Well known physician Dr. W. Gifford Jones, a syndicated columnist was at first taken in by this research, however a vacation on a cruise-ship cleared his thinking ability and he saw the study for the flaw that it was as well. Read his account as reported at Canadafreepress.com.

Manipulation of statistics is an art form in the so-called scientific community and should be an embarrassment but some people you just can’t embarrass. The medical community sang the praises of dangerous Vioxxx and Hormones for years because they were drugs, if they had been vitamins they would have called congressional hearings to have them banned. The bias against vitamins and nutrition is evident when such flawed studies are published in medical journals.

There is always the potential risk if you overdo anything; drink too much water and you won’t feel to well, however, common sense should prevail. Enough quality studies have been done to show the benefits of vitamins and antioxidants in reducing death, hospitalizations and improvement in quality of life, to continue taking them without reservations.

To find out more about antioxidants download a copy of Dennis’ report Antioxidants: The Key To A Better Life, at his website Get A Better Life Today.

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Dennis Cutforth is a researcher and writer with over 35 years experience in health-care sales, marketing and research in pharmaceuticals and natural health. Dennis will cut through all the propaganda and give you the real facts about what really works to make you healthier and happier. Visit his Blog at Better Life Blog.

The Major News Media missed reporting a breakthrough treatment for the prevention of cancer. Why? Is it because this breakthrough isn’t a drug but a simple inexpensive multivitamin with folic acid that can prevent cancers up to 50%? If it were a pharmaceutical that achieved such astounding results it would be in all the news reports on television and newspapers. Is it because there is a bias against vitamins and nutrition which are non-drug treatments or because there is no benefit for Big Pharma?

The headline in the New York Times, LA Times, etc and the sound-bite on the CBS, ABC, NBC, FOX evening news should have read:

New Major Cancer Protective Treatment – A New Breakthrough ‘Drug’ That Prevents Cancers in Children -
Unfortunately it didn’t. I Googled this study from the February 21, 2007, medical journal Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics and nada! The major news outlets in Canada carried it but not in the Good Ole’ USA unless you include the Redding News.

“This is almost too simple an idea for people to take seriously, but they should take it seriously,” said Dr. Gideon Koren, director of the Motherisk program at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. Globe and Mail.

Vitamin Prevention Worth A Pound Of Cancer Cure

Of course the real reason this ‘breakthrough’ information wasn’t reported on in the MNM (Major News Media) was because it wasn’t a Pharmaceutical (with major advertising dollars on the line for MNM) but a simple cheap once a day multivitamin with folic acid.

“Simply taking multivitamins and folic acid during pregnancy can help a mother reduce her baby’s risk of developing the most common childhood cancers by almost 50 per cent, a new study from Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children says.” Toronto Star

“The startling finding that a cheap supplement purchased at a drugstore can prevent cancer as well as a range of birth defects adds weight to the theory that micronutrients have lifelong health benefits for the developing fetus.” Globe and Mail.

Unfounded Bias Against Vitamin Supplements

Maybe the MNM didn’t pick up the story because of a bias against vitamins from so-called vitamin experts like Rory Collins, Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at Oxford University who was reported as saying. –

“It has been said that Americans have the richest urine in the world, because they consume a lot of expensive vitamins and then just pee them out…There is no good evidence that any vitamin supplements are effective. So if you are going to waste your money on these unproven vitamins, you may as well waste less money on the cheaper ones.” As reported in the newspaper – The Independent (London), Feb 9, 2004 by Catherine Nixey.

Or maybe - the New York Times article (April 29, 2003) conclusion that “multivitamins have not been shown to prevent any disease and that it is easy to reach high enough doses of certain vitamins and minerals to actually increase the risk of disease”

For if physicians and the news media can’t be trusted to get even the basic checkable facts right about vitamins, why should any of their opinions be taken seriously? A cursory look at the scientific medical literature reveals the false propaganda from these two sources.

Medicine Acknowledges Vitamin Supplements- the ‘Checkable Facts’

The Journal of the American Medical Association in 2002 reversed its historical anti-vitamin policy by acknowledging that “it appears prudent for all adults to take vitamin supplements”

In 1998 an Editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine was titled: “Eat Right and Take a Multivitamin.”

Harvard Public Health – “Today, though, there’s good evidence that taking a daily multivitamin makes sense for most adults…(and) may prevent heart disease, cancer, osteoporosis, and other chromic diseases.”

A Summary of a few of the Positive Vitamin Studies

The Nurses’ Health Study of over 87,000 women showed that the - “Long-term use of multivitamins may substantially reduce risk for colon cancer.” Annals of Internal Medicine 1998.

A 19,000 patient study found Vitamin C lowered the “mortality (death-rate) from all-causes…” Lancet (2001)

A pooling of the data from several studies “concluded…that 1,000 IU of oral vitamin D per day is associated with a 50% reduction in colorectal cancer incidence.” Recent Results in Cancer Research (2007)

If one was to read these studies one would conclude that supplements have a role to play in prevention of disease. Of course if one was to ignore these studies and or look for negative improperly done studies one could possibly show negative results by selective research to scaremonger, which is a common tactic of Big Pharma, MNM and the Medical Establishment.

Vitamins Cost Savings to the System

Taking a multivitamin for at least 11 years would save the system $58.1 billion as reported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) State-of-the-Science Conference on Multivitamin/Mineral Supplements and Chronic Disease Prevention. May 15–17, 2006. So there’s the crux of the matter, savings of billions of dollars to the system which would normally be shared by the Medical Establishment, Big Pharma and the Major News Media. With a close to 50% prevention for some cancers, an inexpensive multivitamin doesn’t have enough profit to go around. Now you know why the ‘Sounds of Silence Were Deafening for the Cancer Cure.’

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Dennis Cutforth is a researcher and writer with over 35 years experience in health-care sales, marketing and research in pharmaceuticals and natural health. Dennis will cut through all the propaganda and give you the real facts about what really works to make you healthier and happier. Visit his website Get A Better Life Today.

What is the definition of a Clinker – “something that is a failure; a product of inferior quality (dictionary.com).”

The National Cancer Institute and the American Cancer Society claim that ‘we are winning the war against cancer.’ Is this statement based on the ‘Holy Grail’ of ‘Science’? What is the definition of science? – “a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged and showing the operation of general laws…(dictionary.com).”

Surely the proven ’scientific’ effectiveness of medical treatments is the determining factor in a physician’s choice of treatment for patients with cancer. Let us see what the Medical Establishment has to say about their success with the ‘war on cancer’.

Is the Cancer Establishment really ‘winning the war against cancer’?

The December 12th, 2002 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine panned chemotherapy because of a study published in the British Journal of Cancer: “The irony of the whole situation is that a recent randomized trial of treatment for stage 1 multiple myeloma by Riccardi and colleagues (British Journal of Cancer 2000;82:1254-60) showed no advantage of conventional chemotherapy over no treatment.”

According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, for most types of cancer, the chances of surviving more than five years in 1995 was not much better than in 1950:
“…our analysis shows that changes in 5-year survival over time bear little relationship to changes in cancer mortality [death].”1

Things haven’t changed much since. A study in 2004 was not widely publicized by the Major News Media, for obvious reasons. Dr. G. Morgan and colleagues looked into ‘improved survival of cancer patients’ by means of chemotherapy in 85% of cancers. They looked at 22 major adult malignancies in Australia and the United States during the year 1998, (not assessing the other 15% of cancers that are made up of leukemias and rare cancers that chemo is effective against.):

“The overall contribution of curative and adjuvant [supplemental] cytotoxic chemotherapy to 5-year survival in adults was estimated to be 2.3% in Australia and 2.1% in the USA.”2

What this means in English from the mouth of Dr. Morgan himself to a television reporter on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation show The Health Report:

“So in other words if there was no chemotherapy in Australia, the survival of all patients with cancer would drop from 62% to 60%.”3

2% is statistically meaningless and that’s a lot of caustic chemicals in people’s bodies for 2% success. What ‘an embarrassment of (lack) of riches’ from Conventional Medicines own words.

“What We Have Here Is - Failure To Communicate.” -

If Conventional Medicine so effectively states that they are ‘winning the war on cancer’, how did we miss the huge 2% success rate. They should have more effectively ‘communicated’ these exciting results through their puppet channels the news media.

So to put things in perspective since The American Cancer Society and the Cancer Establishment state that their treatments are successful let’s look at physicians and other sources who are aware of the true picture.

“For the majority of the cancers we examined, the actual improvements (in survival) have been small or have been overestimated by the published rates…It is difficult to find that there has been much progress…(For breast cancer), there is a slight improvement…(which) is considerably less than reported.”—U.S. Federal Government General Accounting Office

“The National Cancer Institute and the American Cancer Society have misled and confused the public and Congress by repeated false claims that we are winning the war against cancer — claims made to create public and Congressional support for massive increases in budgetary appropriations.” The Politics of Cancer Revisited by Samuel S. Epstein M.D.

Linus Pauling PhD (Two-time Nobel Prize winner) commented on the state of cancer treatment: “Everyone should know that most cancer research is largely a fraud and that the major cancer research organisations are derelict in their duties to the people who support them.”

“The American public is being sold a very nasty bill of goods about cancer.” - James Watson, co-discoverer of the DNA double helix, and 1962 Nobel Laureate in Medicine for that discovery and related work.

“Even though toxic drugs often do effect a response, a partial or complete shrinkage of the tumour, this reduction does not prolong expected survival…Sometimes, in fact, the cancer returns more aggressively than before, since the chemo fosters the growth of resistant cell lines. Besides, the chemo has severely damaged the body’s own defences, the immune system and often the kidneys as well as the liver.” The Cancer Chronicles, December 1990, Dr. Ralph Moss.

“As a chemist trained to interpret data, it is incomprehensible to me that physicians can ignore the clear evidence that chemotherapy does much, much more harm than good.”—Dr. Alan Nixon, Past President, American Chemical Society.

“My studies have proven conclusively that untreated cancer victims actually live up to four times longer than treated individuals. For a typical type of cancer, people who refused treatment lived for an average of 12-1/2 years.” Dr. Hardin Jones, professor of medical physics and physiology at the University of California, Berkeley. G. Borell, The Peroxide Story (Delano, Minnesota: ECHO, 1988).

“Patients who underwent chemo were 14 times more likely to develop leukemia and 6 times more likely to develop cancers of the bones, joints, and soft tissues than those patients who did not undergo chemotherapy (NCI [National Cancer Institute] Journal 87:10).”—John Diamond M.D.

What we can see from Conventional Medicines own words is that Conventional Cytotoxic Chemotherapy Cancer treatment is a Clinker of ‘inferior quality’ that has FAILED. In any other business the stockholders would revolt and demand a resignation of the top management with poor results like this. The Medical Establishment however, is an insulated self-perpetuating bureaucracy that likes the perks too much to change – it’s time for another approach.
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About the Author

Dennis Cutforth is a researcher and writer with over 35 years experience in health-care sales, marketing and research in pharmaceuticals and natural health. Dennis will cut through all the propaganda and give you the real facts about what really works to make you healthier and happier. Visit his website Get A Better Life Today.

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1. Vol. 283 No. 22, June 14, 2000, “Are Increasing 5-Year Survival Rates Evidence of Success Against Cancer?” H. Gilbert Welch, MD, Journal of the American Medical Association.
2. G. Morgan et al. Clinical oncology (Royal College of Radiologists (Great Britain) 2004 Dec;16(8):549-60. PubMed
3. The Health Report, Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Why does it take so much money to bring drugs to the market and what does Big Pharma get for their investment?

“A report by the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development has cited clinical trials as the main contributor to the upward cost spiral in bringing a new prescription drug to market in the United States. The cost to bring a new drug to market now averages more than $880 million and extends over 10 to 15 years.”1

Some feel that it is actually under $200 million. Nevertheless, who are these large sums $200-800 million paid out to for drug development? As stated above “clinical trials [are] the main contributor to the upward cost spiral”.

Then there are the costs of expensive FDA personnel “We assemble a team of physicians, statisticians, chemists, biologists, microbiologists, pharmacologists, and other scientists to review the sponsor’s data and proposed labeling for the drug.”2

The Medical Bureaucracy Is Like An Expensive Mortgage
With the very expensive process in place before drug delivery to the public what happens when an inexpensive non-patentable product shows promise as a cancer treatment?

A promising well known compound has been found effective in some cancers as reported in Newsweek of January 23, 2007 from the journal Cancer Cell. The lead author, Dr. Evangelos Michelakis stated “… dichloroacetate, or DCA, a drug that kills cancer cells by exploiting a fundamental weakness found in a wide range of solid tumors…One of the great things about DCA is that it’s a simple compound, in the public domain, and could be produced for pennies a dose…But that’s also a problem, because big drug companies are unlikely to spend a billion dollars or so on large-scale clinical trials for a compound they can’t patent.”3.

If this product was sent to the FDA with no Big Pharma champion, who would pay the FDA personnel the huge sums of research dollars to check it out? Therefore, this promising effective product will probably never see the light of day.

Why does the Cancer Establishment Only Promote Pharmaceuticals?

It would be wonderful if the Cancer Establishment decides what’s best for patients based on safety and effectiveness from treatments. Is this the case? Let Dr James Carter, M.D. a former Oncologist (Cancer Specialist) give his expert opinion from his book - “Racketeering in Medicine: The Suppression of Alternatives” –

“May we assume that objectivity goes hand in hand with scientific inquiry? No. Corporations now control the practice of medicine with the weight of their wallets. Driven by the stock market, medicine is embroiled in an economic turf war….The financial giants of business and industry and their corporate sponsored philanthropies, such as the American Cancer Society, spend and lobby mightily for laws representing their investments.” Laws to ensure the use of drugs and not alternatives for cancer.

A newspaper article reported on a cancer patient and former detective who used his training to gather evidence, sort information, and interview people who had experience with cancer. “I learned that making money, not finding cures, is what conventional medicine is interested in.”

The article also stated “Indeed, the bible for those seeking well-researched information about complementary cancer care, Choices in Healing by Michael Lerner, agrees that the pharmaceutical industry is a very powerful force in American science, medicine, business and politics. “The industry must make large profits to realize a return on investment, particularly in a regulatory system where it costs $100 to $200 million to bring a new drug to market. In this environment, drugs that cannot be patented are of little financial interest to the industry.”4

Like an expensive mortgage one has to pay off, you can’t afford to take a cut in pay if you’re trying to keep up with your payments. Similarly only the billions of dollars invested by Big Pharma that delivers expensive drugs can pay the huge Medical Bureaucracy. Inexpensive alternatives don’t have a chance even if they are safe and effective.

As can be seen the almighty dollar plays a significant determining factor on a patients treatment options. And Big Pharma’s Big Bucks Controls Medicine - the Medical Establishment wouldn’t have it any other way.

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About the Author

Dennis Cutforth is a researcher and writer with over 35 years experience in health-care sales, marketing and research in pharmaceuticals and natural health. Dennis will cut through all the propaganda and give you the real facts about what really works to make you healthier and happier. Visit his website Get A Better Life Today.

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1.http://www-306.ibm.com/software/success/cssdb.nsf/cs/JKIN-6MLTSH
2.Ms. Theresa Mullin Ph.D, Associate Commissioner Office of Planning and Evaluation. Food and Drug Administration to the The House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Health, Prepared Witness Testimony, NIH: Moving Research from the Bench to the Bedside.
3.Newsweek of January 23, 2007
4.Sacramento News and Review