Success Story Fertility

Sara (not her real name) faced the statistics of age-related fertility when in her early 40's she wanted to have a family. Sara tried naturally, monitoring her ovulation but nothing happened. Then she tried IUI's (intrauterine insemination) and was still frustrated. She then graduated to IVF's (in-vitro fertilization) . She did two medicated cycles both times producing low quality embryos. This was a very stressful period for Sara. Her work and relationship suffered. Fertility it seemed was her right as a woman but getting pregnant and was going to be a longer journey than she thought.

The stress of infertility is not new. It is chronicled in In the book of Kings. Hannah is described as childless and weeping for years. After counsel with a religious leader she eventually gave birth to the Prophet Samuel. For anyone it can be deeply discouraging to want something that you seem to be unable to get, particularly when you may feel it is your god-given right. The personal choices of health and lifestyle practices as well as empowering emotional support all can help keep your mind centered and thereby promote fertility.

Now Sara was no longer 41 she was 43. The clock was ticking. Upset with the medicalization of her fertility and deeply discouraged by what seemed like an unattainable goal, she decided to work on herself. She came to our clinic and began regular acupuncture sessions and made changes in her diet. She took herbs and nutritional supplments and began to keep a journal. She became engaged in the process of examining her attitudes and beliefs about conception. This led to attending the Fertile soul™ support group. While contemplating whether to try a third IVF Sara fell pregnant on her own. She stuck with her herbs and acupuncture through the first trimester. In the spring Sara gave birth to a healthy baby girl.

If, as the saying goes, "luck favors those who are prepared", Sara story is about sticking with a goal by cleaning up mental and emotional blockages while keeping her body healthy. It is empowering to know that challenges can be overcome. That she defied age-realted statistics is icing on the cake. It does not always happen this way and success can also mean becoming a parent in other ways.

Send us your story or share your comments about this one.

when Back Pain Is Not Back Pain

The musculo-skeletal system is amazingly dynamic. Not that we ever think of it that way until something goes wrong. This is the story of a patient who had severe back pain which interestingly enough was not treated in the back. A 37 year old male patient, otherwise healthy, came to see me complaining of severe back pain lasting for 1 1/2 weeks. Upon examination I noticed that his muscles on the left side of his spine were inflamed and his calf muscles were bulging particularly on the left side. What kind of exercise had he been doing? He told me he was a runner and that he used to skateboard a lot and that was why his left calf was over-developed. Considering that Chiropractic treatments earlier in the week did not provide him enough relief, I decided to do an acupressure test on him. I massaged deeply on the left hamstring and calf muscles to see what his response would be on his back. To my excitement he reported that the muscle tension in his back improved. This was a good clue to do more. So I worked deep into the soft tissue of his legs and glutes bilateral. Then I had him turn over to release the iliopsoas muscle group. These are hip flexor muscles that can cause back pain. His psoas muscles were painfully tight. First I released them with a distal acupuncture point in the foot so I could release them manually in the lower abdomen without causing so much discomfort. It is interesting and amazing to press on a tight psoas muscle (located in the lowest part of the abdomen near the inguinal groove) and have the patient feel intense pain and then put a needle in the foot (GB41 if you really want to know) and have the same psosas muscle area be significantly softer and relaxed instantly. Patients upon feeling this change will say something like "Wow! How can a needle in my foot help my psoas like that." For which I respond, That is the mystery and magic of Acupuncture. To fully relax the person and further soften the back I performed acupuncture. The patient walked out feeling good.

This kind of treatment outcome could not be achieved by acupuncture alone yet happens everyday in our office to people looking for natural solutions to thier health care concerns.

Do acupuncture points exist?

Yan X, Zhang X, Liu C, Dang R, Huang Y, He W, Ding G.

Department of Physics, Surface Physics Laboratory (State Key Laboratory), and Synchrotron Radiation Research Center of Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, People's Republic of China. Shanghai Research Center of Acupuncture and Meridian, Pudong, Shanghai 201203, People's Republic of China.

We used synchrotron x-ray fluorescence analysis to probe the distribution of four chemical elements in and around acupuncture points, two located in the forearm and two in the lower leg. Three of the four acupuncture points showed significantly elevated concentrations of elements Ca, Fe, Cu and Zn in relation to levels in the surrounding tissue, with similar elevation ratios for Cu and Fe. The mapped distribution of these elements implies that each acupuncture point seems to be elliptical with the long axis along the meridian.

Advances Elusive in the Drive to Cure Cancer

Alex Writes:  This NY Times article reviews the history of survival rates of various cancers in wonderful interactive graphs and more... The best part are the letters from readers in response to this article.  

In 1971, flush with the nation’s success in putting a man on the Moon, President Richard M. Nixon announced a new goal. Cancer would be cured by 1976, the bicentennial.

Forty Years’ War

An Expensive Priority

Articles in this series will examine the struggle to defeat cancer.

Multimedia

Interactive Graphic

A Stubborn Disease

Graphic

Still Deadly

Related

As Other Death Rates Fall, Cancer’s Scarcely Moves (April 24, 2009)

Readers' Comments

Readers shared their thoughts on this article.

• Read All Comments (311) »

When 1976 came and went, the date for a cure, or at least substantial progress, kept being put off. It was going to happen by 2000, then by 2015.

Now, President Barack Obama, discussing his plans for health care, has vowed to find “a cure” for cancer in our time and said that, as part of the economic stimulus package, he would increase federal money for cancer research by a third for the next two years.

Cancer has always been an expensive priority. Since the war on cancer began, the National Cancer Institute, the federal government’s main cancer research entity, with 4,000 employees, has alone spent $105 billion. And other government agencies, universities, drug companies and philanthropies have chipped in uncounted billions more.

Yet the death rate for cancer, adjusted for the size and age of the population, dropped only 5 percent from 1950 to 2005. In contrast, the death rate for heart disease dropped 64 percent in that time, and for flu and pneumonia, it fell 58 percent.

Chinese Herbs for Cancer

Alex Writes: This article is a good overview of the TCM approach to cancer treatment.

Chinese herbalists have been medicating patients with tumors for over two

thousand years. 1 In stark contrast to Western oncology concepts that undergo

constant revision, Chinese medical ideas about tumor pathogenesis and herbal

responses have remained largely the same over the centuries.2 Still, though,

Traditional Chinese Medical (TCM) approaches hold strong attraction for human

oncology patients and people whose animals have cancer.3 TCM practitioners

shun the image of “waging war on cancer” and instead embrace the more

peaceful and organic view of cancer as a journey, regarding the patient not as a

battlefield but as a garden to be nurtured.4 5 6

The enormous draw of Chinese medicine and other traditional medicine practices

led the World Health Organization to consider ways to best study the

effectiveness and safe implementation of CAM methods in clinical practice. In

response, they formulated the Traditional Medicine Strategy 2002-2005.7 In the

same year, the White House Commission published a Complementary and

Alternative Medicine Policy.8 Both organizations urged researchers to

investigate the claims and practices of long-held belief systems and empirically

derived treatments. The National Cancer Institute now recognizes that

following the leads laid by longstanding tradition will generate higher yields than

searching for cancer-fighting botanicals de novo.9 Even the Chinese Society of

Traditional Veterinary Science in Taiwan and the Asian Society of Traditional

Veterinary Science have sounded calls for more research and education in

Traditional Chinese Veterinary Medicine (TCVM) and, specifically, in herbal

prescribing.10

The assortment of Chinese herbal treatments being promoted for animal patients

with cancer is growing. Testimonials asserting reductions in tumor size in dogs

who received Chinese herbs further stoke enthusiasm and hopes of finding an

alternative cure.11 12 13 However, rather than basing the herbal prescription on

tumor type or biopsy results, herbs are matched to a patient’s disease “pattern”,

which sorts patients into groups according a system based on visible signs on

the body, the specifics of which are unique to TCM.14

TCM holds that tumors and cancer arise from emotional stress, overwork, poor

nutrition, invasion of pathogens, and poor circulation.15 16 Of these, impaired

circulation ranks as perhaps the most strongly linked etiologic factors leading to

cancer and metastasis.17 18 From a Chinese medicine perspective, the poor

circulation associated with the “blood stasis” pattern will not only deprive tissue of

vital oxygen, absorbed nutrients, and immune surveillance, and it also leads to

the buildup of metabolic end-products in the tissues. Modern oncology resonates

with this perspective at least in part, acknowledging that the microcirculation

within tumors can be abnormal and contain areas of sluggish perfusion.

Furthermore, some researchers have added anticoagulants to chemotherapy

agents in order to lengthen survival and prevent blood-borne metastasis.19

Acupuncture Eases Radiation-induced Dry Mouth In Cancer Patients

ScienceDaily (Apr. 25, 2009) — Twice weekly acupuncture treatments relieve debilitating symptoms of xerostomia - severe dry mouth - among patients treated with radiation for head and neck cancer, researchers from The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center report in the current online issue of Head & Neck.

For the rest of the story either click here or on the title of the post

Soon I will start working at a radiation center I thought I would post relevant research about acupuncture and radiation therapy

Cytotoxicity induced in Bladder Cancer Cells by Frankincense

Frankincense oil derived from Boswellia carteri induces tumor cell specific cytotoxicity
Mark Barton Frank , Qing Yang , Jeanette Osban , Joseph T Azzarello , Marcia R Saban , Ricardo Saban , Richard A Ashley , Jan C Welter , Kar-Ming Fung and Hsueh-Kung Lin

BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine 2009, 9:6doi:10.1186/1472-6882-9-6

Published: 18 March 2009
Abstract (provisional)

Background
Originating from Africa, India, and the Middle East, frankincense oil has been important both socially and economically as an ingredient in incense and perfumes for thousands of years. Frankincense oil is prepared from aromatic hardened gum resins obtained by tapping Boswellia trees. One of the main components of frankincense oil is boswellic acid, a component known to have anti-neoplastic properties. The goal of this study was to evaluate frankincense oil for its anti-tumor activity and signaling pathways in bladder cancer cells.

Method
Frankincense oil-induced cell viability was investigated in human bladder cancer J82 cells and immortalized normal bladder urothelial UROtsa cells. Temporal regulation of frankincense oil-activated gene expression in bladder cancer cells was identified by microarray and bioinformatics analysis.

Results
Within a range of concentration, frankincense oil suppressed cell viability in bladder transitional carcinoma J82 cells but not in UROtsa cells. Comprehensive gene expression analysis confirmed that frankincense oil activates genes that are responsible for cell cycle arrest, cell growth suppression, and apoptosis in J82 cells. However, frankincense oil-induced cell death in J82 cells did not result in DNA fragmentation, a hallmark of apoptosis.

Conclusion
Frankincense oil appears to distinguish cancerous from normal bladder cells and suppress cancer cell viability. Microarray and bioinformatics analysis proposed multiple pathways that can be activated by frankincense oil to induce bladder cancer cell death. Frankincense oil might represent an alternative intravesical agent for bladder cancer treatment.

The complete article is available as a provisional PDF. The fully formatted PDF and HTML versions are in production.

Vitamin E and Prostate Cancer

Vitamin E and Prostate Cancer: A Proteomics Approach Using 2-D Gel Analysis Software

Proteomics can be a useful tool in understanding the anti-cancer activity of vitamin E.

By Christian M. Muenyi, Dr. William L. Stone, Dr. Hamid Kasmai, and Hongsong Yang

Various forms of vitamin E have been under intensive study as chemopreventive and chemotherapeutic agents for a number of cancers.1 Many in vitro, animal, and epidemiological studies have presented evidence of an anti-cancer activity for vitamin E, but there are few studies of vitamin E in prostate cancer,2 and the mechanisms by which forms of vitamin E induce apoptosis in cancer cells remains largely unknown.3 Therefore, proteomics may help to understand the molecular events associated with the cytotoxic effects of vitamin E on cancer cells.


Figure 1: Analysis of 2-D gel by Dymension software showing proteins that are up or down-regulated three hours after delta-tocotrienol treatment.

The purpose of the study was to characterize the proteomic changes occurring in a prostate cancer (LNCaP) cell line after treatment with delta-tocotrienol, a form of vitamin E. In this study, 2-D gel electrophoresis was used to detect changes in protein expression levels associated with this treatment. However, to determine which proteins in a complex 2-D gel image are being expressed requires specialist software to resolve protein spots accurately. Previously, using some 2-D analysis software packages, it was difficult and time consuming to manipulate gel images to obtain meaningful data. To overcome the analysis bottleneck, this article describes how Dymension (Syngene, Frederick, Md.), a 2-D gel image analysis software, can be used to rapidly show which proteins are up or down-regulated by treatment with delta-tocotrienol.

Study Fails to Find Fertility Drug-Cancer Link

Alex writes: Most hormonal cancers occur in women post-menopause. So the story is not over as to whether these drugs increase cancer risk. There are tests to measure how estrogen is metabolized into protective and more proliferative metabolites and how well your liver enzymes break down estrogens. If you have a family history of hormonal cancer and you are using fertility drugs it may be reassuring to do these tests. It is also important to recognize that the treatment for abnormal test result finding are nutritional supplements.
 

June 15, 2004 -- Taking fertility drugs does not appear to increase a woman's risk of developing ovarian cancer, a new study from the National Cancer Institute suggests.

Researchers found no associations between the use of medications that stimulate ovulation and ovarian cancer in a study involving more than 12,000 women who had trouble conceiving. However, a slight increase in risk was seen among women followed for the longest time, but researchers say this increase may not be related to the use of fertility drugs.

"In general our findings are very reassuring," lead researcher Louise Brinton, PhD, tells WebMD. "We failed to confirm a major increase with the use of these drugs, but most of these women are still relatively young. For this reason, the association warrants further follow-up."

Early Findings Mixed

Since their introduction almost four decades ago, ovulation-stimulating drugs like Clomid have been prescribed to millions of infertile women. Previous studies assessing the impact of these drugs on ovarian cancer risk have been mixed, with one study suggesting up to a 27-fold increase in cancer risk among treated women who never got pregnant and other studies failing to find any link at all.

The NCI trial included 12,193 women who were seen at five infertility clinics throughout the country between 1965 and 1988. Of these, more than 4,000 women had used a fertility drug.

By 1999, 45 of the women had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer, which was almost twice the number expected in the general population.

But when the researchers adjusted for other ovarian cancer risk factors, the use of fertility drugs was not found to significantly increase cancer risk.

In other words, ovarian cancer risks were similar regardless of whether these women used fertility drugs or not.

Clomid users actually had slightly fewer ovarian cancers than would be expected in the general population, while users of the protein hormone gonadotropin had slightly more cancers.

Fifteen years after treatment, the odds of developing ovarian cancer more than doubled among the small group of gonadotropin users followed for many years.

"These women are only now beginning to reach the age range where ovarian cancer is most often diagnosed," Brinton says. "That is why it is important to continue following them."

Women Who Don't Get Pregnant

Fertility expert Alan DeCherney, MD, says recent studies are consistent in finding no link between fertility drug use and ovarian cancer risk. It is now clear that women who never achieve a pregnancy are at increased risk, however, and DeCherney says earlier studies failed to take this into consideration.

"We now know that women who fail to get pregnant -- with or without fertility treatments -- are at greater risk," says DeCherney, who is a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at UCLA School of Medicine and a past president of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. "Since those who can't conceive are the ones who take fertility drugs, it is easy to see why the early studies made this association."

SOURCES: Brinton, L. Obstetrics and Gynecology, June 2004; vol 103: pp 1194-1203. Louise A. Brinton, PhD, division of cancer epidemiology and genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Md. Alan DeCherney, professor of obstetrics and gynecology, UCLA School of Medicine; past president, American Society for Reproductive Medicine.

Evidence-Based Interventions for Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy

Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN) continues to be a significant, debilitating symptom resulting from the administration of neurotoxic chemotherapy for the treatment of cancer.  CIPN is an important consequence of cancer treatment because of its potential impact on physical functioning and quality of life.  Oncology nurses play an important role in assessing, monitoring, and educating clients about CIPN.  Despite investigations concerning pharmacologic and nonpharmologic approaches to either preventing or minimizing the neurotoxicity resulting from certain chemotherapeutic agents, evidence to support the interventions is lacking.  This article presents information concerning CIPN and summarizes the pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic approaches to the prevention and treatment of CIPN.  

Alex writes:  Acupuncture and some nutritional supplements I have found are very effective for this problem.