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Letters to the Editor Issue 94

by Letters(more info)

listed in letters to the editor, originally published in issue 94 - November 2003

Complementary Medicine – Prepare for the Future

by Richard Eaton
Thank you for the article in Positive Health. It contained excellent advice, some of which I will take up today.

I am a complementary healthcare practitioner, instructor at a private school of Reflexology and more recently a part-time lecturer at Harrogate College. I am part of the complementary healthcare team working with cancer patients and based in the Macmillan Dales Unit at Harrogate District Hospital. Following the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology (6th report) on CAM in 2000, I have followed with interest the development of ‘Group 2’ therapists like myself.

I realized how potential integration into the NHS would impact on training and education. Most practitioner courses do not provide the solid advice you have given with regard to integration into the NHS as the concept is still fairly new. The private schools which are more geared to health have smaller class numbers; however the fees tend to be prohibitive for some. Everything has a beginning, and my wish would be for complementary practitioners training to be recognized by the NHS, perhaps along the lines of schools of nursing, whilst acknowledging the essence and value of the individual therapies both as a stress management tool and the alleviation of many symptoms. This would be invaluable for those of us seriously interested in working within the NHS.

Having said that, there should always be a place for individual private practice working peacefully away from the hubbub!

In Harrogate and District, many first class practitioners run their clinic from home, some very professionally. Some private complementary clinics have set up and sadly failed. There are many practitioners working from beauty clinics where there are the time constraints you mentioned, and often the environment is more conducive to pure relaxation than health concerns. There are a few who hire rooms within a GP practice.

I would like all practitioners from whichever environment they practise to set up, maintain professional standards and belong to associations which ask for CPD as part of the membership.

I would love to see an integrated health service. I’m not sure whether it will happen in my career life time.

Your article certainly resonated with me so I thank you once more. I hope it reaches a wide circulation so that many people will take on board the bigger picture that is in front of us all.

Pam Smith MBSR ITEC Dip. BFRP MIGPP MDYTA MAR (Assoc)
pam.smith@tinyworld.co.uk

Help for Central Nervous Pain?

I wonder if you can help me please. My dad has been in tremendous pain for over 9 years in his Central Nervous System. He has been taking a variety of different medicines to be able to live with the pain including morphine, but they aren’t helping him at all anymore and he has to just keep increasing the dose.

The only thing that did help him was when he attended a Chinese Herbal shop where they gave him some tablets and Acupuncture which he found effective; but due to the cost of this each week which was £50, he had to stop going and now the pain is back worse than ever.

Do you know of any trials or any other treatment that may be able to help him with the pain he is in all the time or any other way he can be able to get any other help.

Thank you for your help.
Sharon Brown
Sharonb227@aol.com

Do Or Die For Nutritional Supplements!

On 3 July 2003, the European Food Supplements Directive was passed into English law. By 31 July, it will have passed into the national legislature of all 15 EU member states. This law, if unchallenged, will have the effect of banning (from 2005) over 300 vitamin or mineral forms contained within around 5000 discrete products presently on the European market. This includes the majority of key vitamin and mineral products containing the most effective and bioavailable forms, as used by practitioners. The legislation is phased, so by 2007 (if not earlier) it will also be applied to other nutrients groups such as fatty acids, amino acids phytonutrients with likely further devastating results.

But the legislation is not bad for everyone – it is actually set to benefit players selling low dose, simple, synthetic vitamin and inorganic mineral products around the EU. However, it poses a major threat to the continued supply of innovative and highly bioavailable, food-form nutritional supplements used by practitioners as tools of trade.

The UK Stitch-Up
You may have followed the way in which transposition of the Food Supplements Directive in to English law was forced through the Parliament in England (see ANH Latest News items on; 17, 20, 22 July 2003; www.alliance-natural-health.org). Peers in the House of Lords actually defeated (132 to 79) the Government, urging Ministers to revoke the transposition of the regulations in to English law. But their motion was ‘non-fatal’ so it could not actually stop the legislation.

The vote by the Standing Committee in the House of Commons was then rigged. The five Labour Members of Parliament who were going to vote against it were removed from the committee and replaced just prior to the vote. Even then the vote was passed by only 8 votes to 6! But this outrageous news was barely covered in the media.

The Key Solution
The Alliance for Natural Health has been working since its inception 16 months ago on ways to halt the EU law steamroller, which will eliminate all forms of innovative nutritional therapy if allowed to proceed unchecked. Real progress has been made in changing at first reading the Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive and amendments to the Pharmaceuticals Directive. But the time for lobbying in respect of The Food Supplements Directive is over. The only option remaining now to eliminate the harmful effects of the Food Supplements Directive is to present a legal challenge.

The ANH Proposed Legal Challenge
The Alliance for Natural Health www.alliance-natural-health.org is a pan-European and international organisation of scientists, practitioners, lawyers, public relations and media experts working specifically to amend European legislation in order to maintain the availability of innovative, safe and effective food supplements. We have a broad swathe of support across the UK, Ireland, Sweden, Netherlands, Denmark, Italy and France, as well as outside the EU in countries such as Norway, USA, Canada, Australia, South Africa, Chile, India and New Zealand. Our pan-European composition is critical to the challenge, which will focus on EU constitutional law arguments and the disproportionate impact of the ban on food-form nutrients.

Join the innovators and support the ANH campaign The challenge needs to be filed by mid-September at the latest and the work to meet that deadline needs to commence immediately.

Accordingly we are asking all clinics and practitioners concerned with innovative, leading-edge dietary supplements to join the rapidly increasing group of ANH supporters around Europe and the world.

Companies impacted negatively by the Food Supplements Directive are joining the rapidly growing ranks of ‘innovators’ supporting our campaign (see Support Base on www.alliance-natural-health.org). Some companies may presently be not too severely affected by the restriction on permitted vitamin and vitamin forms. However they may be hit further down the line because of the anticipated restrictions on allowed dosage levels, as well as by likely future restrictions on other nutrient groups.

The Team
From its inception in February 2002, ANH has worked with the best people available. The AN H Expert Committee of scientists comprises some of the most eminent in their respective fields, including Dr Damian Downing, Dr Lawrence Plaskett and Emeritus Professor Malcolm Hooper. Our Public Affairs team in Brussels, GPlus (www.gpluseurope.com), are highly acclaimed public affairs and media experts. Our outhouse lawyers, who will lead our proposed challenge against the Food Supplements Directive, include the UK’s leading EU barristers who are the only team to have successfully overturned an EU directive – indeed they created the legal precedent for such challenges.

We have a European Advisory Board with key members from complementary health associations, consumer groups and trade associations in Sweden, Ireland, Italy, France, Denmark, Netherlands and the UK. The diverse Support Base of ANH puts us in an ideal position to challenge the Food Supplements Directive

Your support is needed NOW!
We are asking practitioners and clinics to assist immediately to help us to proceed with our challenge. We are poised to commence the legal challenge, but now require your financial support to enable us to proceed rapidly and protect your interests. Based on liaison with the key complementary health  associations that support us (see Support Base on website), we suggest the following rates of immediate donation (on receipt, unless requested otherwise, clinics and websites will be added to the ANH Support Base): £10 for complementary practitioners, where nutrition is a minor part of their practice; £50 for complementary practitioners, where nutrition is a major part of their practice; £100-500 for clinics, depending on size of practice and dependence on nutrition

Further Information

Donations can made directly to the ANH account (by credit card direct via the ANH website) Account name: Alliance for Natural Health Bank: Natwest Bank, Guildford High Street, Guildford, England Sort code: 60-09-21; Account: 12765309; Swift code (for overseas transactions): NWB KGB 2L.
Dr Robert Verkerk BSc MSc DIC PhD, Executive Director David Hinde LLb Solicitor, Legal Director Alliance for Natural Health. Tel: 01252 37127; info@alliance-natural-health.org;
www.alliance-natural-health.org
Buy Natural Health Products Online
www.worldwidehealthcenter.net
Alternative and Complementary Medicine Practitioner Directory www.worldwidehealthcenter.net/directory.php

Advice and Resources re Breast Cancer CoEnzyme Q10

From what I have seen CQ10 is non toxic even at much higher level then 390mg. Dr Hulda Clark uses up to 4 grams a day in her regimen! It is best taken in an oil base (such as olive oil or organic butter) at body temperature. Like vitamin C it might help reduce the toxic drugs needed as well as protect you from them. So it is imperative that the drug dosages be adjusted accordingly.

From my researches I can say: taking interest and directing your own treatment is the best strategy to deal with this affliction or any affliction for that matter. Remember that, at least, you will have your own best interests at heart! In general, society discourages independent and intuitive thinking. This leads to lack of confidence in one’s own abilities and serves as a great control tactic for the vested interests.

Most drugs are immune compromising and will not solve the cancer problem in the long run. This is why the first treatment will usually determine the final outcome. If the first treatment severely damages the immune system then most of resources to deal with the cancer will be usurped and the long term out come will likely be poor. Please review any drug contraindications before using. A good way to do this is to check the drug at: http://rxlist.com/

One must also find and change the original source that is contributing to the cause, such as any nutritional and/or environmental issues. Or the whole process will become more like bailing out water from a boat that has holes.

“…The sicker a person is the more nutrients are needed in optimum doses to help the bodies reparative mechanisms…”

“…eliminate all junk food i.e. food containing any added simple sugars like table sugar or glucose as in corn syrup. This simple rule, comprehensible even to children, will eliminate nearly 90% of the additives commonly added to processed foods…”

Also note: dehydrated patients may not respond well to any type of therapy!

For breast cancer Dr Derry’s book is a must read: Breast Cancer and Iodine: How to Prevent and How to Survive Breast Cancer by Dr David Derry MD PhD. Trafford Publishing. 2001.

“The book is divided into four parts. The first part discusses iodine. From published facts, we can arrive at a proposal that iodine could be the first phase of a two phase cancer defence system. It appears that iodine in the extra-cellular fluid outside of the cells is the main surveillance system for abnormal cells. Iodine also triggers the natural death of normal cells in the body. There are many cells types in the body undergoing a natural death. For example some of the cells in the stomach have lives of only 2-3 days. The name of this process is apoptosis.

“Carefully documented descriptions of the cancer process at different places in the body reveals most cancers have similar stages through which it passes. The cancers are not really cancer until the cells start to move by invasion through the nearby connective tissue. Cells develop abnormalities for a variety of reasons and can continue to become abnormal all the way up through atypical cells and to carcinoma in situ. Carcinoma in situ is the dividing line between the two phases of cancer development. Iodine in correct doses will reverse all of the changes up to and including the carcinoma in situ.

“The thyroid hormone controls connective tissue function. So connective tissue around organs forms a structural biological barrier to the spread of cancer. Cancer spread to distant organs only develops in the connective tissue of those organs. Therefore, if the connective tissue defence is not strong then the cancerous cell from a distant site can land there and grow. If, however, the thyroid hormone level in the connective tissue is high enough then the connective tissue will perform its normal defence duties and not allow the cancer cell to enter it and develop.

“Using these principles, fibrocystic disease and breast cancer become more understandable. Supplemental iodine in the correct doses will remove all lesions from carcinoma in situ back to just an abnormal cell by triggering death of these cells by apoptosis. Spread of cancer cells in the connective tissue can be arrested by adequate treatment with thyroid hormone to strengthen the connective tissue barrier.

“My experience with patients using this approach so far has been successful. The principles are that there are two phases to cancer: one controlled by iodine and the other by thyroid hormone. Thus the book deals with the prevention and survival of breast cancer.”

Breast Cancer and Iodine: How to Prevent and How to Survive Breast Cancer by Dr David Derry MD, PhD. Trafford Publishing. 2001. and Cure Breast Cancer By Avoiding All Milk Products by Prof. Jane Plant (www.rense.com/general35/av.htm)

Her theory remains a controversial one – but every woman should read it and make up her own mind. I suspect the processed fats like all Trans fats and hydrogenated and pasteurized milk are the main culprits.
See also: Bill Sardi’s Cancer Regimen (www.askbillsardi.com/sdm.asp?pg=cancer_regimen)

Last but not least, check out the slightly updated: Electricity the Mother of all Medicine.    
(www.newmediaexplorer.org/chris/2003/06/19/electricity_the_mother_of_all_medicine.htm) A great immune enhancing adjunct to improved nutritional support!   

Chris Gupta
www.newmediaexplorer.org/chris/2003/08/14/some_cancer_resources.htm

PSA Screening Test for Prostate Cancer:

Interview with Otis Brawley MD
by Maryann Napoli 2003

The prostate-specific antigen (PSA) screening test for early prostate cancer has been surrounded by controversy ever since it was introduced over 15 years ago. The test can indicate the presence of cancer, but many men have a form of prostate cancer that will remain dormant or is so slow-growing that it will never cause symptoms. Neither this test, nor any other can distinguish which prostate cancer will become lethal. Furthermore, there is no proof that the use of the PSA blood test to screen symptom-free men will spare anyone a prostate cancer death, yet it is associated with a considerable amount of unnecessary treatment with after effects that can be both severe and permanent. All of the treatments for early prostate cancer carry the risk of impotence and incontinence. In short, cancer researchers do not know whether PSA screening saves more lives than it ruins.

Otis W Brawley MD is the brains behind the ongoing National Cancer Institute Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial, which is designed to answer questions about the effectiveness of screening and the causes of prostate cancer. After leaving the National Cancer Institute, Dr Brawley became the Director of the Georgia Cancer Center and Professor of Medicine, Oncology, and Epidemiology at Emory University School of Medicine. He is interviewed about the ever-increasing use of PSA screening in the face of so much uncertainty about its value.

Napoli: Does the popularity of PSA screening concern you?

Dr Brawley: First of all, I’m not against prostate cancer screening. I’m against telling people that it is well established; and that it works; and that it saves lives when the evidence that supports those statements simply does not exist. I’m a tremendous supporter of the real American Cancer Society (ACS) recommendation, which is: Within the physician-patient relationship, men should be offered PSA screening and should be informed of the potential risks, as well as the potential benefits and be allowed to make a choice.

Napoli: Do you think fully informing men about PSA screening happens very often?

Dr Brawley: I think it rarely happens. Many doctors are uninformed, and that’s a big problem. My great concern is people being misled. I routinely follow the prostate cancer screening recommendations of 18 organizations in the US, Canada, and Western Europe. The two most pro-screening recommendations are those of the ACS and the American Urologic Association. Both say it should be offered to men; men should be informed of the potential risks and the potential benefits; and they be allowed to make a choice. The ACS does not recommend that men of normal risk be offered mass screening. There’s a distinction between what is done within a doctor/patient relationship at a doctor’s office and mass screening.

Napoli: What is the difference?

Dr Brawley: Mass screening takes place at a booth at a mall where screening is offered to anyone who comes by and wants screening. In the last few years, there has been screening on the floor of the Republican National Convention, health fairs at the mall, [TV] channel this or channels that will have a health fair with prostate cancer screening. Yet there is no organization that endorses mass screening because of the concern that you can’t have informed consent.

Napoli: If policy makers aren’t promoting the test, who is?

Dr Brawley: The British Medical Journal recently published an article about how several of the leading prostate cancer survivor organizations [based in the US] that do a lot of the pushing of screening are funded by the makers of the PSA screening kits. And, indeed, [these survivor organizations] do things that the Food and Drug Administration won’t let the manufacturers do – like make promises that there are only benefits from prostate cancer screening. Many of these prostate survivor organizations that I’m critical of – that take drug company money – offer mass screening.

Napoli: You were once quoted in The New York Times saying that 30-40% of men whose cancers appear to have been confined to the prostate at diagnosis will recur soon after treatment.

Dr Brawley: Yes, this [brings up] one of the lies perpetrated about prostate cancer. If you look at the prostate cancer outcomes from a huge study conducted by the National Cancer Institute, close to 40% of men who undergo a radical prostatectomy will have a PSA relapse within two years. This means that they had disease that was outside of the prostate that was not obvious to the surgeon or the pathologist. It means that if the man lives long enough, metastatic disease will kill him.

Napoli: The public is always told that early detection is lifesaving. How true do you think that is for prostate cancer?

Dr Brawley: If you have a group of men diagnosed as a result of PSA screening, 30-40% don’t need to know that they have prostate cancer because it’s meaningless in terms of risk to their health. And for somewhere between 30% and 40% of the men with prostate cancer, no matter what [treatment is given], the disease is not curable. And then maybe there are about 20% who actually benefi t.

Napoli: And there’s no way to know which type of prostate cancer you have.

Dr Brawley: That’s right.

Napoli: What about African American men, who as a group, are at a particularly high risk for prostate cancer? PSA testing is thought to be advisable for them at an earlier age.

Dr Brawley: The proportion of black men in Rocky Feuer’s paper [for the Journal of the National Cancer Institute] who don’t need to know they have prostate cancer was over 40%, compared to 30% of white guys. The reason it’s higher for black men is that they have so many other competing causes of death. The other issue is this: It’s a principle of cancer screening that, unfortunately, many of the advocates of screening just don’t comprehend, and that is, the more aggressive cancers are less likely to benefit from screening. There are people out there who say we must screen black men because they have more aggressive prostate cancer. [These screening proponents] do not realize that they are saying, in effect, because prostate cancer screening is less likely to benefit black men, then we must screen black men.

Napoli: You recently published a medical journal article about informed consent and the PSA test.

Dr Brawley: Yes, the problem I have is that people are not open and honest about all the controversies, and this extends to people being not open and honest about the treatments, once prostate cancer is diagnosed. Men tend to get railroaded toward radical prostatectomy or to external-beam radiation, or to seed implants.

Napoli: Since there’s no evidence that any one of these treatments is superior to another or superior to no treatment, for that matter, where do you suggest men go for unbiased information?

Dr Brawley: First of all, I think we should tell men what is scientifically known and what is scientifically not known and what is believed and label them accordingly. [As for credible sources of information,] the National Cancer Institute’s PDQ treatment statements at www.cancer.gov are good [call 800/4-CANCER]. So is the ACS’s information. And by the way, we at Emory have figured out that if we screen 1,000 men at the North Lake Mall this coming Saturday, we could bill Medicare and insurance companies for $4.9 million in health care costs [for biopsies, tests, prostatectomies, etc]. But the real money comes later – from the medical care the wife will get in the next three years because Emory cares about her man, and from the money we get when he comes to Emory’s emergency room when he gets chest pain because we screened him three years ago.

Napoli: You’re saying that screening creates long-term customers. So, did Emory Healthcare decide to go ahead with the free PSA screening on Saturday?

Dr Brawley: No, we don’t screen any more at Emory, once I became head of Cancer Control. It bothered me, though, that my PR and money people could tell me how much money we would make off screening, but nobody could tell me if we could save one life. As a matter of fact, we could have estimated how many men we would render impotent… but we didn’t. It’s a huge ethical issue.

Further Information

Source:


Study Suggests Mercury in Fish May Be Less Toxic 

by Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent. Reuters. 2003.
The mercury that builds up in the flesh of fish may be less dangerous than people feared, scientists have said.

The finding by the researchers, which may come as good news to pregnant women and others who have eaten fish, indicated the structure of the mercury molecules may make them less toxic to people, though they stressed more study is needed.

“There may be reason for cautious optimism,” Graham George, who did the work at the Stanford University Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory in Menlo Park, California, said in a statement.

“The mercury in fish may not be as toxic as many people think – but there is a lot we need to find out before we can make this conclusion,” added George, now at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada.

Mercury is a potent neurotoxin that is especially harmful to developing foetuses and can cause sensory loss, tremours, loss of muscular co-ordination, speech, hearing, and visual problems, as well as increased risk of heart attack.

A metal, it can build up in tissues.

It gets into the environment when toxic waste is burned and the mercury molecules fall from the smoke onto the ground and into water. There it builds up in the bodies of animals that eat contaminated plants and drink contaminated water.

Predatory fish, such as tuna, swordfish and lake bass, are especially likely to have high levels of mercury in their flesh. For this reason, the US government advises pregnant women to limit how much they eat.

But an important factor is what the mercury, a reactive element, binds with and environmental toxicology experiments have presumed it is methylated – tied up with carbon and hydrogen atoms.

But George and colleagues report in this week’s edition of the journal Science that the mercury in fish is actually attached to both a carbon atom and a sulphur atom.

And since sulphur attaches more tightly to other elements than methyl groups do – it is possible that would make the mercury less likely to be metabolized, or taken up, by the body.

The researchers used X-ray absorption spectroscopy to look at the physical structure of the mercury compounds in fish muscle tissue.

They tested day-old zebra fish larvae and found the sulphur-mercury compound was less toxic than methylmercury chloride, the compound often used to determine the toxicity of mercury in fish.

“People have used methylmercury chloride to model the toxic properties of mercury in fish because they don’t know what’s on the mercury. And now that we know what’s on the mercury in fish tissue, we can better investigate its toxic properties,” said George.

Now they will look at what form of mercury compound accumulates in mammals that eat mercury-laden fish.
“Once we understand how mercury is bound in mammalian tissues, we’ll be ideally poised to design a drug that could perhaps remove it,” George said.

Further Information

http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=healthNews&storyID=3352920

Source:

aajonus optimal@earthlink.net> via chrisgupta@alumni.uwaterloo.ca

Fluoride in Dentist’s Cleaning Pumice

It’s no secret that many of us are attempting to avoid ingestion of fluoride.  While water fluoridation is by far the largest threat, here is another source that came to my attention last week.

I went to the dentist to get a problem tooth checked and get my teeth cleaned.  The problem tooth had a hairline crack and had been causing me nerve discomfort for several months, and I eventually had to get a crown on it. The tooth started bothering me again… I put up with it for about 6 weeks, but the nerve sensitivity and headaches became more than I wanted to deal with.

The dentist said I had to get a root canal through the crown, which was not a good option. I decided to get a second opinion, and was informed that the crown was perhaps not the best original course of action.  Too late to change that. He then recommended using a prescription fluoride toothpaste – with 4 times the amount of fluoride contained in over-the-counter products!  Not an option either!

Later that day I spoke with a colleague that recommended high-quality olive leaf tincture (in glycerin). I smeared that over the general tissue area about once an hour, and it seemed to help some. Later that day I ran an emem-type of plasma device with 90/10 duty cycle, using the general anti-pathogen frequencies, and sitting about 18 inches from the tube. I could feel activity during this session and within 2 hours the pain level was considerably diminished.  It continued to subside over the next few days until it was no longer a problem, and I could drink hot and cold fluids again. There was only one session with the tube more than one month ago, and the tooth seems to be stable. I continue to use the tincture on occasion for maintenance, and will probably use the plasma tube once in awhile for the same reason.

And for the fluoride part of this story… when I went back to the new dentist I reported the results, telling the hygienist I was not comfortable with using the high-fluoride product without trying every other possible option. At that point she told me that the pumice they routinely use to clean people’s teeth also has fluoride in it! I was needless to say, very surprised. The good news is, she said she had some that had no fluoride (and also no flavouring).

It seems pretty strange that people are routinely having this dangerous chemical applied to their mouths during a preventive procedure, without being properly informed.

Source:

Further Information


Allergic Disease and Spinal Problems Link

We researchers have discovered a possible link between allergic disease and spinal problems.

Our research paper explores the link between Crohn’s disease and allergies such as atopic dermatitis, hay fever, allergic rhinitis, and asthma.

The adrenal cortex function recovery cure method which declines chronically with spinal problems is the fundamental cure method of allergic diseases.

We researchers concluded that the allergic disease can not heal using steroid medicaments. We point out that there is a high probability that cure methods which don’t require steroid medicaments are suppressed.

As for the professional doctor, they tend to comment without confirming spinal problems of the patients actually by themselves.

We have developed new methods for allergic diseases and are obtaining over 80 percent improvement with these diseases.

The recovery of chronic declined adrenal cortex function of the patients is the only way to conquer allergic diseases.

It is a final cure method which approaches the fundamental cause of disease. We expect that all allergy patients to conquer a disease with our therapy. We intend to provide our therapy willingly.

Further Information

www.jvsr.com/
Long Term Remission and Alleviation of Symptoms in Allergy and Crohn’s Disease Patients Following Spinal Adjustment for Reduction of Vertebral Subluxations
www.newswise.com//articles/2003/5/CROHNS.WCA.html
www.worldchiropracticalliance.org/media/crohns.htm
Y Takeda, Rehabilitation Medicine and Human Engineering Researcher. Chiropractor, Japan.
takeda-y@enjoy.ne.jp

Black Cohosh Extracts Safe

A review of black cohosh, said to be the most comprehensive to date, finds it to be safe, just days after another study suggested that the herb, taken as an alternative to hormone replacement therapy (HRT), could trigger the spread of breast cancer.

The report in Menopause, the bimonthly journal of the North American Menopause Society, evaluated pre-clinical and clinical research in oestrogen-sensitive populations, including women at risk for breast cancer and breast cancer survivors, as well as human cell lines most relevant to breast cancer.

It found strong evidence for the safety of several black cohosh extracts in humans, contrasting with a recent abstract presented this week at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), which found black cohosh to speed up the spread of breast tumours in mice.

“This paper should reassure health professionals that they can safely recommend black cohosh to their menopausal patients who cannot or choose not to take HRT,” said lead author Dr Tieraona Low Dog, Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of New Mexico Department of Family and Community Medicine and advisor to the NIH Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. “Well studied, non-oestrogenic symptom management alternatives help address individual women’s symptoms, health profile and personal preferences.”

The paper, entitled Critical Evaluation of the Safety of Cimicifuga racemosa in Menopause Symptom Relief, is the first to review all published literature pertaining to pre-clinical and clinical safety of various forms of Cimicifuga (black cohosh), as well as the FDA and World Health Organisation adverse event reporting systems, monographs, compendia, internal unpublished data from a major manufacturer, foreign literature, and historical, anecdotal reports.

In human clinical trials, uncontrolled reports, and post-launch evaluations of over 2800 patients, the review found a low incidence of adverse events with black cohosh – 5.4 per cent. Of the reported adverse events, 97 per cent were minor and did not result in discontinuation of therapy, and the only severe events were not attributed to Cimicifuga treatment, according to the report.

Source Article

Dog TL, Powell KL, Weisman SM. Critical evaluation of the safety of Cimicifuga racemosa in menopause symptom relief. Menopause. 10(4): 299-313. 2003.

Source:

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