Re: arimidex

[Guest guest]

Hi

I have a patient who has been taking another aromatase inhibitor - sorry its

not arimidex but it does the same thing. Its called Femara. I can't say

that her experience with it has been very successful. Her cancer has continued

to spread - but obviously there are many factors involved in this. The one

thing that I could say is that my patient has the most awful bladder

irritation as a direct result of this drug. If she stops the bladder mix that

I have

given her she feels that she has constant severe cystitis. It honestly was

very severe and she is now totally dependent on the herbal mix to keep this

at bay. The difficulty with all these cancer drugs is that everyone's

experience is different so your patient may not get this irritation but may

have

another symptom. Sorry, I know its not too helpful but I'm not convinced that

these things work. I don't know if you are a member of NIMH but there is a

very good article on the members site in the use of Soya in taking up oestrogen

receptor sites - thereby possibly acting as an effective way of reducing

oestrogen in the body. Its at least another piece of information for your

patient.

Dow

[Guest guest]

Dear Annette,

I understand and agree too - re Soya. I'm much in the same camp in that its

simply too risky to advise something that really I'm not too sure about

myself. I never recommend it to my cancer patients as I just don't know

enough,

but wish I did. Its just another piece of information in the whole scheme of

things. I'm confused as to how the chinese populations that eat a lot of

soya have lower incidence of breast cancer/chronic diseases etc. Surely if its

the type of soya they are eating, then if we import that type of soya, it

should have the same benefits in the Western world. I know there is a lot to

do with the diet overall, but there are also very convincing studies done

about the benefits of soya. Am I being too simplistic??? I'm sorry if this

has

gone off the track a bit. The thing is that even the medics are pretty much

unsure about most of the oestrogen blocking drugs too and I've always been

of the opinion that if you block something chemically in the body, the body

will then try and devise other ways to compensate.

Jean

[Guest guest]

thanks for your input.

her consultant told her not to take soya as he said it can promote breast

cancer.I told her about the opposite view of it competing for oestrogen sites

but I honestly didnt feel confident about saying yes its absolutely fine as

there is such a divided camp for and against soya.

any other opinions re arimidex and/or soya in breast cancer very welcome.

thanks again , annette

[Guest guest]

Fermented soy (miso or tempeh) seems to be OK - other

forms of soy including tofu and soy milk do seem to

promote breast cancer.

The studies of the beneficial effects of soy were done

on traditional forms of soy and the results

extrapolated to include all soy.

Fidler

--- Annette Wass

wrote:

> thanks for your input.

> her consultant told her not to take soya as he said

> it can promote breast cancer.I told her about the

> opposite view of it competing for oestrogen sites

> but I honestly didnt feel confident about saying yes

> its absolutely fine as there is such a divided camp

> for and against soya.

> any other opinions re arimidex and/or soya in breast

> cancer very welcome.

> thanks again , annette

>

>

> [Non-text portions of this message have been

> removed]

>

>

[Guest guest]

cancer bacup do quite good information sheets on different treatments. you

can search them on google

Re: arimidex

> thanks for your input.

> her consultant told her not to take soya as he said it can promote breast

> cancer.I told her about the opposite view of it competing for oestrogen

> sites but I honestly didnt feel confident about saying yes its absolutely

> fine as there is such a divided camp for and against soya.

> any other opinions re arimidex and/or soya in breast cancer very welcome.

> thanks again , annette

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

Hi Annette, There is also another issue with soy products. Cancer patients

often have impaired digestive function and soy, except in its fermented,

traditional forms contains high levels of phytic acid which is a very potent

enzyme inhibitor. Their traditional use is purely as a nitrogen fixing plant

( companies like Monsanta have then created a market for other products to

create income).

Used long term in any dietary regime they will create chronic nutritional

deficiencies.

Also a number of the products sold in the west as fermented have been

fermented in ways which make them little better than the unfermented ones.

They are absolutely a non-started for breast cancer patients where the

tumours are oestrogen receptive. And personally I wouldn't give them house

room at all except as traditionally fermented products used occasionally.

Allshorn.

Re: arimidex

[Guest guest]

Hi, I think we should be very careful with this.

As far as my work with cancer patient's is concerned soy is an absolute

no-no, it has oestrogenic type effects which are not desirable for patients

with oestrogen receptive tumours and given that there is a whole issue

around the role of hormone interference in the form of HRT and the

contraceptive pill in the development of breast cancer to begin with it

makes no sense to then use a product which taken in its raw form, as a

supplement has very powerful oestrogen like effects and traditionally has no

use whatsoever in this form. Traditional use being as fermented products

where the fermentation process removes the nasty chemicals which inhibit

digestion and cause long term chronic nutritional deficiencies where it is

used in any other way.

Also if a patient is taking chemotherapy to inhibit hormonal actions is it

not counter productive to then use herbs or foods with a strong hormonal

influence. The poor body ends up not know what it's supposed to be doing.

I suspect this doesn't help a lot.

Re: arimidex

[Guest guest]

Dear Annette, I have a son living in Korea, not China I know but similar

dietary basics and he has pointed out this is a western perception of the

diet. They actually eat fat more fruit, vegetables and rice. Soya and meat

are much smaller portions of the native diet and they, generally outside of

western influence, i.e. rural areas, eat far less than the westerner.

This means that there are far more dietary factors playing in this one than

the soy.

Rather like the western interpretation of the Indian doctor who is

successfully treating cancer patients. He uses the whole Ayurvedic system

with his patients but the bit the western doctors have latched onto is an

herbal preparation. This must be the cure because diet etc. does not help

cancer patients!!

The studies on Soya- who is writing these, what is the evidence, is it

extrapolated from animal studies.

It really is not traditionally used as human food. If we then use it in that

way we may be ignoring centuries of wisdom which indicate this is not good

for us. Even where it's fed to animals it is only used with ruminants who

can process better the very solid bean. And you only give them a relatively

small amount in relation to the whole of the rest of the diet. In the west

we have tended to move towards using soy as the substitute for milk rather

than realizing that beyond babyhood if we are eating a properly balanced

diet we don't need milk, or milk substitutes.

Actually thinking on my feet with that one, I wonder what the psychological

reasons for that are. Are we all still stuck in babyhood and wanting

permanent nurturing? Are we refusing to grow up? Have we been totally

brainwashed into believing all the media hype?

Plus the work done in the other direction is equally convincing so in the

face of such conflicting views then I think your approach is a very wise

one.

Give the patient the information but let them decide and don't get drawn

into recommendations.

Re: arimidex

[Guest guest]

Hi Annette

when I was a young wholefood eating " back to the lander " I tried eating

soya beans. Hmmm. Well eventually I found they were just about

edible if you boiled them for hours, then fried them with lots of

cabbage and dill, but only just.

Now I like tofu and miso! (Miso soup and seaweed were the main diet at

the poorhouse in Hiroshima ( or Nagasaki?) and I believe that there was

some considerable surprise at the high survival rate of the

inhabitants)

sally

> Dear Annette, I have a son living in Korea, not China I know but

> similar

> dietary basics and he has pointed out this is a western perception of

> the

> diet. They actually eat fat more fruit, vegetables and rice. Soya and

> meat

> are much smaller portions of the native diet and they, generally

> outside of

> western influence, i.e. rural areas, eat far less than the westerner.

> This means that there are far more dietary factors playing in this

> one than

> the soy.

> Rather like the western interpretation of the Indian doctor who is

> successfully treating cancer patients. He uses the whole Ayurvedic

> system

> with his patients but the bit the western doctors have latched onto

> is an

> herbal preparation. This must be the cure because diet etc. does not

> help

> cancer patients!!

> The studies on Soya- who is writing these, what is the evidence, is it

> extrapolated from animal studies.

> It really is not traditionally used as human food. If we then use it

> in that

> way we may be ignoring centuries of wisdom which indicate this is not

> good

> for us. Even where it's fed to animals it is only used with ruminants

> who

> can process better the very solid bean. And you only give them a

> relatively

> small amount in relation to the whole of the rest of the diet. In the

> west

> we have tended to move towards using soy as the substitute for milk

> rather

> than realizing that beyond babyhood if we are eating a properly

> balanced

> diet we don't need milk, or milk substitutes.

> Actually thinking on my feet with that one, I wonder what the

> psychological

> reasons for that are. Are we all still stuck in babyhood and wanting

> permanent nurturing? Are we refusing to grow up? Have we been totally

> brainwashed into believing all the media hype?

> Plus the work done in the other direction is equally convincing so in

> the

> face of such conflicting views then I think your approach is a very

> wise

> one.

> Give the patient the information but let them decide and don't get

> drawn

> into recommendations.

>

> Re: arimidex

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

thanks to everyone for their thoughts on soya.

I just by chance ,as I was clearing a backlog of journals and papers, ( as you

do on glorious sunny days !!) came across a small item from the journal of

nutrition referring to a study ( admittedly done on female rats regreattably )

that suggested it is the anti oestrogenic properties of brown seaweed that is

the primary cancer fighting component of the asian diet not soy which fits in

with what several people have alredy suggested.obviously its not as simple as

the one thing but it does seem that perhaps the " perceived wisdom " re soya is

somewhat askew.

Im still very keen to pass on some info re arimidex pros and cons if any one has

any thing that would be helpful to my patient.

thanks very much , annette

[Guest guest]

It may be helpful for the time being to help her with some good liver

herbs. All of the medicinal mushrooms would be very good (very good book

on the subject: Hobbs; Medicinal Mushrooms) You could ad

Astragalus in your mix, good for clearing obstructions.

> Hi

>

> I have a patient who has been taking another aromatase inhibitor - sorry

> its

> not arimidex but it does the same thing. Its called Femara. I can't say

> that her experience with it has been very successful. Her cancer has

> continued

> to spread - but obviously there are many factors involved in this. The

> one

> thing that I could say is that my patient has the most awful bladder

> irritation as a direct result of this drug. If she stops the bladder mix

> that I have

> given her she feels that she has constant severe cystitis. It honestly

> was

> very severe and she is now totally dependent on the herbal mix to keep

> this

> at bay. The difficulty with all these cancer drugs is that everyone's

> experience is different so your patient may not get this irritation but

> may have

> another symptom. Sorry, I know its not too helpful but I'm not convinced

> that

> these things work. I don't know if you are a member of NIMH but there is

> a

> very good article on the members site in the use of Soya in taking up

> oestrogen

> receptor sites - thereby possibly acting as an effective way of reducing

> oestrogen in the body. Its at least another piece of information for

> your

> patient.

>

> Dow

>

>

>