Do you know anyone cured of cancer using diet changes only?

No one can be ‘cured’ of cancer by changing their diet alone. However, it is very important to note that keeping or obtaining a healthy diet after getting cancer will greatly increase your changes of being cured. This combined with a cancer treatment plan from your Dr and Medical Physicist is the best approach (e.g. a multiprong approach)

No. Sadly, I know lots of people who had, have, or will have cancer. For the most part, they use diet, supplements, attitude, exercise, meditation, laughter as ancillary modalities along with traditional surgery, chemo, and radiation.

As far as I know (I’m no doctor to tell for sure) cancer CAN come into a remission state all of the sudden.

This could happen to people who have changed their diet and then run into this state, causing an “post hoc ergo propter hoc” fallacy (“after this, therefore, because of this”).

The diet and the remission could be just a coincidence.

http://www.healingcancernaturally.com/cancer-diet-and-nutrition.html

Here is a web site that might answer this for you. There are many others and yes I know a man that was cured of cancer without any conventional treatment.

Also note that people go into remissions all of the time and furthermore more from that, many people get cancer without ever knowing they have it and then go into remission before they ever have symptoms.

@Summum

“I know a man that was cured of cancer without any conventional treatment.”

As has been mentioned, remissions happen all of the time.

As far as the question- diet may assist in treatments of some types of cancer. For example, in dogs, a low-carbohydrate diet may help ‘starve’ some tumors. However, diet alone will not cure cancer.

@crisw I think you are wrong about that. Just saying.

Cancer cells and bacteria do not survive in an Alkaline PH and by eating the right things you can help keep your PH level Alkaline. Sickness thrives on an Acidic PH.

Before someone else mentions it there are web sites that debunk what I just stated though there are many more that show the studies going on and the reasearch in this field.

The problem with arguing that diet “cures” cancer is that diet will often never be an isolated variable. I think @crisw‘s response is a highly reasoned one – we can say that diet aids in the fight against cancer, but I doubt we’ll ever see proof of it.

Unfortunately, proof would require isolating the variable of diet and preventing people from getting parallel treatment – I would hate to think of the negative ethical implications of such a study.

No. I know of no one personally who has not succumbed to cancer after the initial diagnosis, and it’s quite a lot of people when I count them up! Unfortunately a lot of them are direct relations, so if I had to bet on my own demise it would be c…

As has been said, spontaneous remission is a possibility but I don’t think diet plays a part. It’s more complicated than an acid/alkali balance. That’s just nonsense.

If this were true, my mother wouldn’t be fighting cancer right now. She’s spent roughly the last 35 years eating all natural foods, organic and homegrown when she can. She’s been working in nutrition and health for as long as she’s been eating like that. With an uncommon and advanced form of cancer her diet has been helping tremendously – I’m sure. But it won’t cure it.

People who may have actually had that experience, or feel that is the cause of their recovery are happy, grateful and eager to spread the word. But I would politely ask them to shut the fuck up. Because people cling to easy things, and they run from scary things. And they’re doing no good deeds.

@SuppRatings: How could you possibly state that more people are fine and never know they had it? Who the hell reports on that?

@Summum Cancer cells and bacteria do not survive in an Alkaline PH and by eating the right things you can help keep your PH level Alkaline. Sickness thrives on an Acidic PH

I’m afriad you are badly misinformed. Alkaliphilic bacteria not only exist, they are the most studied and best understood of all the bacteria. In the human body the most basic defense against bacteria is actually an acidic enviroment in the stomach.

“Cancer cells being anaerobic cannot live in oxygen. They can only thrive in very low oxygen conditions. When the ph of the body is maintained by consuming an alkaline diet the immune system of the body stays strong. This leads to the cells getting enough oxygen and discarding their toxic waste. Cancer will neither thrive nor take birth under such circumstances.

How does an alkaline diet prevent cancer? Such a diet leads to a high alkaline body ph. This high alkaline body ph results in alkaline tissues in the body. Alkaline tissues hold 20 times more oxygen than acidic tissues. Cancer cannot live in an oxygenated atmosphere. If the cells are oxygen rich they will not turn cancerous.”
Just a cut n paste job. Don’t know if it’s true or not.

@Summum: I’m pretty sure that if all you had to do to cure cancer was change your pH, we wouldn’t have half a million people dying of cancer annually or spend nearly $5 billion annually on cancer research. We would just eat more vegetables.

Yes, diet is important to health. But diet changes alone have almost no possibility of curing cancer.

The whole point of doing scientific studies of cancer treatments is to find out what the most effective treatments are. We know for a fact that survival rates following chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery are significantly higher than survival rates without them. There is some evidence that diet can be helpful in cancer treatment, but I have seen no evidence that it is actually better than the current standard of care.

I believe standard treatments can extend life in cancer patients. What we’ve not addressed is what quality of life exists when on chemo or radiation? And , although this would vary, how long would this “life” be extended? For me, a few months of being alive with severe fatigue, muscle wasting, metallic taste, spending a lot of time in clinics and nausea would be worse than no life at all. JMO.

I don’t mean to be accusatory, but claims like this only shift the blame to the victim and adds guilt to their list of worries. “If you had just eaten better, you wouldn’t have gotten sick” is not what a cancer sufferer wants to hear and telling them that won’t benefit them.
Maybe in some cases, medications are more harmful than the disease they attempt to treat. But in my opinion, backlash against modern medicine has gone way too far. People idealize the shit out of living a “natural” lifestyle, but if we were better off never touching anything “unnatural,” we would have shorter lifespans now than our hunter-gatherer ancestors had (which we don’t).

Today’s medicine is a wonderful thing and should be used when needed. That is not to say that you shouldn’t also be using the Alternate treatment as well. If the person is in the first stages of cancer and wants to try foods and suppliments then so be it but if they are very sick then they ought to look hard at what they need to do and modern medicine may be the answer.

And then, @Aster , there are many many of us who did the chemo and radiation thing (no picnic, I’ll grant you that) who are still here and have excellent quality of life. Please don’t cite only the worse case scenarios as the norm.

I am so glad when I see questions like this and have my most recent Skeptical Inquirer issue in my bag handy. In fact, there is a wonderful article by Reynold Spector entitled “Seven Deadly Medical Hypotheses” and manipulating one’s nutrition in order to prevent cancer is his Deadly Hypothesis number 5. Most of the studies that are used to support this hypothesis were methodologically flawed and conducted as case-control studies in the 70’s and 80’s. More recent studies using randomized methodology have debunked it so ‘there is no sound evidence that 5 or more daily servings of fruits and vegetables, large amounts of fiber, or supplemental folate prevent cancer.’

So it is my belief that while nutrition is important, it will not prevent cancer (though I do think eating certain things like processed meats will lead to certain cancerns like colon cancer, etc.) nor do I think any nutritional protocol can cure cancer. Nor do I think chemotherapy is all that hot, either and the author of the above article agrees with me because his Deadly Hypothesis 7 is that cancer chemo has been a major medical advance when, in fact, the average cancer patient is only 5% better off now than in 1950 because truly successful chemo+radiation tx have been discovered for a fraction of cancers (testicular, Hodgkin’s disease).

So it’s a lose-lose when you have cancer. People should consider all options and make decisions they’re comfortable with. They shouldn’t be pushed into tx (especially if they’re terminal) but they shouldn’t be fooled by charlatans out there talking about how consuming peach seeds will save you from the world.

And note that in the language of cancer survivors, the word “cured” is never used. I was treated for breast cancer almost 15 years ago. I had two lumpectomies, removal of lymph nodes under one arm, radiation, chemo and five years on oral tamoxifin.

No day at the beach (@JilltheTooth and I were on the same holiday, it sounds like) but doable and bearable. Now I am considered officially “in remission.”

I have a yearly mammogram and check-up with the oncologist with blood work that looks for cancer markers.

In the last 10 years, I have stopped eating all animal protein and opted for a vegetarian diet. I have an exercise program designed for my creaking and aging body that I do religiously.

I incorporate meditation, diaphragmatic breathing, laughter, organic food and cat therapy into my daily activity. I feel good, I feel content, I feel that I will probably get out of bed tomorrow morning and still be alive.

YES! It is possible. If you follow this program you can help your body to cure itself like it’s designed to. When you cut your hand your body starts the healing process immediately. The same thing goes for Diseases.

N.E.W. S.T.A.R.T. Program for fighting All Dis-eases.

N – Nutrition – proper nutrition is key. Adopt a vegan lifestyle by eating at least 60% of your meals raw. This means a lot of fruits and vegetable salads. Don’t eat and drink with your meals. Don’t eat late at night.
E – Exercise – Work toward exercising for at least 30 min every day.
W – Water – Drink at least your body weight divided by two in ounces every day. So if you weighed 100 pounds divided by 2 would be 50 ounces. That’s at least 6 8oz glasses of water a day
S – Sunlight – Be sure to get adequate sunlit but don’t over do it.
T – Temperance – Eat responsibly of that which is good and stay away from that which is bad (coffee, white sugar, white bread, alcohol, drugs, stimulants, chocolate etc.)
A – Air – Learn how to breathe properly. When you breathe in your belly should push out (not in) and when you breathe out your belly should go in. Do deep breathing every day
R – Rest – Get at least 8 hours of rest. At least 3 of those hours should be before midnight.
T – Trust in Divine power – If you believe in God Trust him to do for you what you can’t do for yourself. If you don’t believe in God get rid of, as much as possible, the stress in your life. Bad stress impairs your immune system.

All of these activities are designed to aid your body’s immuse system to function at peak performance. It is your immune system that will get rid of the cancer in the body. The more of the above activities you can handle the better. Even if right now you can only do one. Do it. It will help you build up to the rest.

Good Luck.

@livingchoice I’m sorry, I really don’t want to stir up anything, but I (and anyone else who has actually been sick) find it pretty offensive when people say “oh, anyone can be healthy if they just eat right!” or the equivalent. Trust me, I bent over backwards to do all of those things on your list (with the exception of your last T). I made myself crazy being a control freak, trying to live the optimal healthy lifestyle, because statements like yours made me feel like it was somehow my fault I was sick. It wasn’t. Some things are just genetic. There are some things that eating right and drinking enough water won’t fix. “Natural” (as in, “your body’s natural defenses”) doesn’t always equal healthy, in fact, in my case, it was my own immune system that was attacking my body. Sorry for coming off so harsh.

@Mariah No offense taken and Yes you are correct. There are some diseases that are caused by genetics and all the potions and lotions in the world can’t cure. But most diseases, which are due to lifestyle habits (diabetes, hypertension, Aids, most cancers, acid reflux, etc.) can be cleared up by the above suggestions.

And still yet some diseases are only cured by getting rid of negativity. A lot of stress, unforgiveness, hate, bitterness will negate any good thing you try to use to heal yourself until you release those negative feelings.

So it’s not just eating right. What I gave above covers the whole being believe it or not. :O)

@livingchoice: I hope that neither you nor any of your friends or family ever get cancer of any kind and then hope to achieve remission with only NEW START.

Actually NEW START is not only for those who are sick. It works great at preventing disease by keeping your body’s defenses up at peak performance. As a matter of fact did you know that almost everyone has cancer cells in them? It’s just that in some of us our body’s defenses are able to fight them off and some are too weak to fight off the cancer cells.

In these forums it’s hard to type out every detail. Think of it as an overview. Each section is broad and have much more information for the treatment of disease. This method has helped many people recover for all sorts of ailments.

Alkaline diet is the way to go.