Selected Office Based Anticancer Treatment Strategies

Abstract

Integrative anticancer strategies are based upon the basic observation that, for a patient to develop, a serious cancer multiple systemic abnormalities must be occurring simultaneously: Genetically, biochemically, immunologically, and hormonally, which must be addressed from a functional medicine point of view. Over the years, the treatment of patients with cancer has varied widely as much because of recent advancements in science and medicine as the philosophies that belie their use. Targeted therapies against cancer fall into several classes of therapeutic agents that act through a variety of direct and indirect effects. Direct approaches target tumor proteins (antigens), enzymes, or genes to alter their signaling, information transduction, or expression. This study briefly describes many of the prevailing approaches in use today with an attempt to offer some perspective on how to apply these disparate methodologies so that they may be more effectively integrated, resulting in consistently better clinical responses. Research is needed to codify the algorithm necessary for applying the best therapeutic strategy given the dynamics of the patient’s biochemistry and immunology at any given point in their treatment.