Cancer, Vitamin C, Linus Pauling

Dr. Robert Rowen, MD is internationally known for his work in the field of complementary, alternative and integrative medicine. He is known as the "Father of Medical Freedom" for his efforts to legalize alternative medicine in 1990 in Alaska. He worked with Senator Ward and Governor Hickel to accomplish this amazing feat.

The rare medical freedom he enjoyed in Alaska enabled him to greatly expand his knowledge and experience in a multitude of disciplines and therapies not normally found in medicine.

Jumping into alternative medicine in 1983, through a practice in acupuncture, he quickly incorporated nutritional medicine, chelation therapy, oxidation therapy, homeopathy and herbal medicine, and took intensive training in neural therapy and prolotherapy to help treat and eliminate acute and chronic pain.

Alaska's laws enabled him to work extensively with innovative cancer therapies, ozone, and ultraviolet blood irradiation therapy.

He is internationally known and respected for training hundreds of open-minded physicians in these techniques from around the world. Dr. Robert Rowen is truly one of the health heroes I met and became friends with over 45 years of health research.

Orthomolecular Medicine - For Health and Mental Illness

Orthomolecular medicine describes the practice of preventing and treating disease by providing the body with optimal amounts of substances which are natural to the body. The term "orthomolecular" was first used by Linus Pauling in a paper he wrote in the journal Science in 1968. This paper first described the theoretical foundations for what was later to become a specialty within complementary medicine.

The key idea in orthomolecular medicine is that genetic factors are central not only to the physical characteristics of individuals, but also to their biochemical milieu. Biochemical pathways of the body have significant genetic variability in terms of transcriptional potential and individual enzyme concentrations, receptor-ligand affinities and protein transporter efficiency. Diseases such as atherosclerosis, cancer, schizophrenia or depression are associated with specific biochemical abnormalities which are either causal or aggravating factors of the illness. In the orthomolecular view, it is possible that the provision of vitamins, amino acids, trace elements or fatty acids in amounts sufficient to correct biochemical abnormalities will be therapeutic in preventing or treating such diseases.Want to learn more? The following essays give a more detailed overview of the nature, efficacy and history of orthomolecular medicine. Continue Reading >>

Linus Pauling

When Linus Pauling died on Aug. 19, 1994, the world lost one of its greatest scientists and humanitarians and a much respected and beloved defender of civil liberties and health issues.

Because of his dynamic personality and his many accomplishments in widely diverse fields, it is hard to define Linus Pauling adequately. A remarkable man who insistently addressed certain crucial human problems while pursuing an amazing array of scientific interests, Dr. Pauling was almost as well known to the American public as he was to the world's scientific community. He is the only person ever to receive two unshared Nobel Prizes — for Chemistry (1954) and for Peace (1962). Continue Reading >>

Linus Pauling--Molecular Diseases, Sickle Cell Anemia

Sickle cell anemia is a serious condition in which the red blood cells can become sickle-shaped (that is, shaped like a "C").

Normal red blood cells are smooth and round like a doughnut without a hole. They move easily through blood vessels to carry oxygen to all parts of the body. Sickle-shaped cells don't move easily through blood. They're stiff and sticky and tend to form clumps and get stuck in blood vessels.

The clumps of sickle cells block blood flow in the blood vessels that lead to the limbs and organs. Blocked blood vessels can cause pain, serious infections, and organ damage. http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/Sca/SCA_WhatIs.html

Linus Pauling orthomolecular medicine until end of millenium

Linus Pauling about orthomolecular medicine until the end of the millenium (1993).

VITAMIN C KILLS CANCER CELLS

Intravenous Vitamin C is Selectively Toxic to Cancer Cells
(OMNS) National Institutes of Health scientists have confirmed the concepts that vitamin C is selectively toxic to cancer cells and that tumor-toxic levels of vitamin C can be attained using intravenous administration. The article, published in the September 12, 2005 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (1) concluded, “These findings give plausibility to intravenous ascorbic acid in cancer treatment.”

Orthomolecular medical researchers, including Nobel laureate Linus Pauling, have long recognized the great importance of vitamin C in fighting cancer. (2) Scientists associated with the Bio-Communications Research Institute (BRCI) in Wichita, Kansas have published 20 scientific articles on the subject. (3) BCRI researchers first reported in 1995 that vitamin C in sufficient amounts is selectively toxic to tumor cells. The authors concluded that tumor-toxic levels of vitamin C could be achieved only by giving the vitamin intravenously. Subsequent research from BCRI, published in the British Journal of Cancer in 2001 (4), was the first to describe in detail the pharmacokinetics of high doses of intravenous vitamin C.

"It is gratifying to have our research on vitamin C and cancer confirmed by scientists at the prestigious National Institutes of Health," said Neil Riordan, Ph.D., BCRI’s Research Director. “The findings reinforce our goal and commitment to pursue cutting edge cancer research,” added Michael Gonzalez, Ph.D., D.Sc. of the University of Puerto Rico.

BCRI’s vitamin C research was headed by its founder Hugh D. Riordan, M.D. The research team includes Dr. Xiaolong Meng, Dr. Joseph Casciari, Dr. Nina Mikirova, Dr. Jie Zhong, Dr. James A. Jackson, Dr. Don Davis, Dr. Jorge Miranda, Dr. Michael Gonzalez, Dr. Neil Riordan, and Mr. Paul Taylor.

What is Orthomolecular Medicine?
Linus Pauling defined orthomolecular medicine as "the treatment of disease by the provision of the optimum molecular environment, especially the optimum concentrations of substances normally present in the human body." Orthomolecular medicine uses safe, effective nutritional therapy to fight illness. For more information: http://www.orthomolecular.org/

Continue reading >>

VITAMIN C DOES NOT CAUSE KIDNEY STONES

By Steve Hickey, PhD and Hilary Roberts, PhD.

(OMNS) It is strange how some medical authors seem desperate to show that vitamin C causes harm. One recurrent scare story is that vitamin C might cause kidney stones. However, although such warnings pop up regularly, these reports do not demonstrate an increase in the number or size of stones; instead, they rely on vague indicators of improbable risk.

The authors of such uncritical papers have probably not read the literature, for this is an old story. Decades ago, the idea that vitamin C causes kidney stones formed part of the medical attack on Linus Pauling. While it was initially a reasonable hypothesis, unexpected kidney stones are not found in people taking large amounts of vitamin C. (1,2)

There is no evidence that vitamin C causes kidney stones. Indeed, in some cases, high doses may be curative. (3) A recent, large-scale, prospective study followed 85,557 women for 14 years and found no evidence that vitamin C causes kidney stones. (4) There was no difference in the occurrence of stones between people taking less than 250 milligrams per day and those taking 1.5 grams or more. This study was a follow up of an earlier study on 45,251 men. This earlier study indicated that doses of vitamin C above 1.5 grams reduce the risk of kidney stones. (5) The authors of these large studies stated that restriction of higher doses of vitamin C because of the possibility of kidney stones is unwarranted.

People with recurrent stone formation may have an unusual biochemistry, leading to increased production of oxalate from vitamin C. (6) Oxalate and urate can accumulate in kidney stones. In practice, there is an increased excretion of both oxalate and urate with gram level doses of vitamin C (ascorbate). Various authors over the years have used this increase to predict that vitamin C will cause kidney stones; however, these predictions have never been confirmed.

Around three quarters of all kidney stones are composed of calcium oxalate; unlike some other stone types, these can form in acidic urine. Although vitamin C does increase the production of oxalate in the body, there is no evidence that it increases stone formation. It could even have the reverse effect, for several reasons. Firstly, vitamin C tends to bind calcium, which could decrease its availability for formation of calcium oxalate. Secondly, vitamin C has a diuretic action: it increases urine flow, providing an environment that is less suitable for formation of kidney stones. Finally, stone formation appears to occur around a nucleus of infection. High concentrations of vitamin C are bactericidal and might prevent stone formation by removing the bacteria around which stones form.

Vitamin C could also prevent other types of kidney stones. Less common forms of stone include uric acid stones (8%), that form in gout, and cystine stones (1%), which can occasionally be formed in children with a hereditary condition; these stones are not side effects of vitamin C. Other stones include those made from calcium phosphate (5%), which dissolve in a vitamin C solution. Acid urine, produced by ascorbate, will also dissolve the struvite stones (magnesium ammonium phosphate) that often occur in infected urine.

Recently, Linda Massey and colleagues from Washington State University have claimed that vitamin C increases the risk of kidney stones. (7) Their paper illustrates how the claims of risk have little basis in fact. Massey claims that vitamin C supplementation can increase the amount of oxalate. Vitamin C can increase oxalate absorption and, if degraded in the body, ascorbate can be converted into oxalate. However, while oxalate is a constituent of some types of kidney stone, an increase in its concentration does not mean that more or larger kidney stones will be formed. The formation of kidney stones is influenced by many factors and, as we have seen, vitamin C might be predicted to inhibit several aspects of stone generation. Massey suggests that this increase in oxalate may increase the risk of stones. This is a weak suggestion, which is contradicted by substantial evidence, quoted above. Continue reading >>

NOBEL PRIZE WINNER AND SEVEN OTHER GIANTS OF MEDICINE INDUCTED INTO THE ORTHOMOLECULAR MEDICINE HALL OF FAME

(Toronto, May 14, 2005) Eight giants in the field of medicine, who were advocates of the use of nutrition in the treatment of cancer, were inducted in the Orthomolecular Medicine Hall of Fame on May 14, 2005 at a special reception held at the Fairmont Château Laurier in Ottawa, Canada.

The annual induction ceremony is one of the highlights at The International Society for Orthomolecular Medicine (ISOM) 34th Annual International Conference, Nutritional Medicine Today, which this year met in Canada's capital and at which leading physicians and scientists from around the world gather to discuss ground-breaking studies in nutritional medicine, cardiovascular disease, oncology and mental health.

All inductees, whose seminal work has been influential in the medical and scientific worlds, are pioneers in their respective fields and include the Nobel Prize winner who discovered vitamin C, and numerous advocates of Vitamin C Therapy especially with respect to cancer treatment. The 2005 inductees are: Emanuel Cheraskin, MD, DMD; Max Gerson, MD; David Horrobin, MD, PhD; Josef Issels, MD; Frederick Klenner, MD; Cornelius Moerman, MD; Hugh Desaix Riordan, MD and Nobel Prize Winner Albert Szent-Gyorgi, PhD.

Although they have now passed away, their contributions to the betterment of mankind have been significant and will live long after them. Members of their families and colleagues were on hand to join in the acknowledgment and celebration of their life's work.

Dr. Cheraskin, who, for decades, headed the Department of Oral Medicine at the School of Dentistry at the University of Alabama was among the very first to recognize and demonstrate that oral health indicates total body health.

Dr. Horrobin was Medical Adviser and President of the Schizophrenia Association of Great Britain and his study of human physiology lead him to investigate the role of fatty acids and their derivatives in human disease and to investigate the therapeutic potential of lipids in medicine.

Dr. Max Gerson, began observing that cancer could be cured with nutrition in tandem with systemic detoxification. Albert Schweitzer stated that Dr. Gerson was one of the most eminent geniuses in medical history, while Prince Charles who knew of a terminally ill patient who had undergone Gerson Therapy and is alive and well remarked that "rather than dismissing such experiences, we should further investigate the beneficial nature of these treatments."

Dr. Issels also believed that good nutrition and a clean environment were central to his cancer therapy and felt that cancer was the ultimate symptom of a lifetime of immune system damage which had created an environment for a tumor to grow while conventional therapy just looked at the tumor without recognizing this longtime preconditioning period.

Dr. Klenner asserted that vitamin C is the safest substance available to the physician and was the first doctor to emphasize that small amounts of ascorbic acid do not work and that only adequate uses and huge doses of vitamin C will provide results.

Dr. Moerman's name remains symbolic in the Netherlands as a leader in nutritional therapy for the treatment of cancer as he also believed that strengthening the immune system by proper nutrition was the answer to this disease.

Dr. Hugh Riordan was the first to demonstrate how large doses of vitamin C are chemotherapeutic for cancer patients and his vitamin C intravenous chemotherapy studies are being continued at the University of Kansas and at McGill University in Montreal.

Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, PhD, won the 1937 Nobel Prize in Medicine for his discovery of vitamin C. In fact, it was he who named the vitamin ascorbic acid and first predicted its use in cancer treatment.

Last year, the first inductees to the Orthomolecular Medicine Hall of Fame included double Nobel Prize laureate LINUS PAULING, PhD; WILLIAM KAUFMAN, MD, PhD; WILLIAM J. McCORMICK, MD; EVAN SHUTE MD and WILFRID SHUTE, MD; ALAN COTT, MD; HUMPHRY OSMOND, MD; CARL PFEIFFER, MD, PhD; IRWIN STONE and ROGER J. WILLIAMS, PhD. Continue Reading >>

MOST DIETS NEED SUPPLEMENTATION - Even "Good" Ones

Most illness is due fundamentally to malnutrition. This not only includes the chronic diseases, but also viral and bacterial acute illnesses, which are greatly aggravated by inadequate nutrition. The usual US diet provides an insufficient amount of vitamins to maintain optimal health. And the evidence base for the clinical effects of vitamins is increasing rapidly.

Only 3 percent of a large sampling of U.S. adults practices what is commonly considered a healthy lifestyle. An American Medical Association survey of 153,000 men and women between the ages of 18 and 74 found that only 23.3 percent reported consuming five servings of fruits and vegetables per day. [1] New federal nutritional guidelines specify a minimum of nine servings of fruits and vegetables per day. [2] Many Americans find that consuming the minimum quantities of fruits and vegetables each day is impractical, and appear unable to provide the needed nutrition for themselves and their families. An alternative is to eat all the fruits and vegetables possible, and supplement with a multivitamin/multi-mineral, 400 IU of vitamin E and 1000 mg of vitamin C. [3] A better alternative is to supplement twice a day after meals.

The usual U.S. diet provides an insufficient amount of vitamins. [4] Yet decades of scientific evidence has shown that vitamins, especially vitamin C and vitamin E, are of the utmost importance to human health.

Two-time Nobel Prize winner Dr. Linus Pauling was among the first to realize vitamin C's crucial importance in the maintenance of a healthy immune system. In 1970 he proposed that regular intake of vitamin-C in amounts far higher than the Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) could help prevent and shorten the duration of the common cold. Although the medical establishment immediately voiced their strong opposition to this idea, many ordinary people believed Dr. Pauling and began taking large amounts of vitamin-C. Most people immediately noticed a great decrease in the frequency and severity of their colds. [5] Continue Reading >>

Vitamin C Fights Heart Disease

Millions die each year from heart disease and stroke, and the overwhelming evidence is that vitamin C supplementation would save many lives.

Two-time Nobel Prize winner Dr. Linus Pauling estimated that the rate of heart disease would be reduced by 80 per cent if adults in the US supplemented with 2,000 to 3,000 mg of vitamin C each day. According to Dr. Pauling, "Since vitamin C deficiency is the common cause of human heart disease, vitamin C supplementation is the universal treatment for this disease."[1] Heart disease is the number one killer in the US. For those with existing heart disease Dr. Pauling said that blockage of heart arteries could actually be reversed by supplementing with 6,000 of vitamin C and 6,000 of lysine (a common amino acid) taken in divided doses throughout the day. Vitamin C supplementation both lowers serum cholesterol levels and repairs lesions of arterial walls. 1998 Nobel Prize winner Dr. Louis J. Ignarro found that supplementing with vitamin C and vitamin E significantly reduces the risk of developing arteriosclerosis.[2]

A study examined vitamin E and vitamin C supplement use in relation to mortality risk in 11,178 persons aged 67-105 who participated in the Established Populations for Epidemiologic Studies of the Elderly over a nine year period.[3] Simultaneous use of vitamins E and C was associated with a lower risk of total mortality and coronary mortality after adjusting for alcohol use, smoking history, aspirin use, and medical conditions.

A landmark study following over 85,000 nurses over a 16-year period for a total of 1,240,000 person-years found that vitamin C supplementation significantly reduced the risk of heart disease.[4] Intake of vitamin C from foods alone was insufficient to significantly effect the rate of heart disease. High quantities of vitamin C from supplements was essential to provide the protective effects. The study adjusted for age, smoking, and a variety of other coronary risk factors.

An international team pooled data from nine prospective studies of 293,000 people that included information on intakes of vitamin E, carotenoids, and vitamin C, with a 10-year follow-up to check for major incident coronary heart disease events in people without disease when the study began. Dietary intake of antioxidant vitamins was only weakly related to a reduced coronary heart disease risk. However, subjects who took as little as 700 mg of vitamin C daily in supplement form reduced their risk of heart disease events by 25 per cent compared to those who took no supplements. [5] Read the full story>>

JOURNAL OF ORTHOMOLECULAR MEDICINE NOW ONLINE

(OMNS February 29, 2008) The archives of the Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine are now posted online. Past issues from 1967 through 2002 are available for downloading, at no charge, at http://orthomolecular.org/library/jom/index.shtml

"36 years of important material is now freely available to everyone," said Steven J. Carter, Executive Director of the Toronto-based International Schizophrenia Foundation, which publishes the Journal.

The Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine has led the way in presenting, in advance of other medical journals, new health concerns and treatments including niacin therapy for schizophrenia and coronary disease; vitamin C for cancer; and the nutritional treatment of behavioral disorders, and drug and alcohol abuse. The JOM was also the first medical journal to publish papers on the nutritional treatment of allergies, autism, and AIDS. JOM published pioneering research on candiasis in 1978, mercury amalgam toxicity in 1982, and chronic fatigue syndrome in 1988. The Journal has published over 100 papers on nutritional medicine and cancer, and over 400 articles on schizophrenia and other psychiatric illnesses. JOM is peer-reviewed.

The Journal was founded in 1967 as the Journal of Schizophrenia, and subsequently titled the Journal of Orthomolecular Psychiatry until 1986. Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling authored 9 papers in the Journal from 1970-1992. It was Pauling that gave nutritional medicine the name "orthomolecular." Says JOM Editor-in Chief Abram Hoffer, MD, PhD: "In 1968, Dr. Pauling proposed the term orthomolecular (1,2) which we recognized as the correct word to define the total interest in nutrition, clinical ecology, and the use of vitamin and mineral supplements. All the pioneers in orthomolecular medicine have reported their findings in this journal. It thus represents a unique source for these earlier and current studies which provide a basis for the increasing growth of nutritional medicine." Continue the full article >>

How Vitamin C Stops Cancer

ScienceDaily (Sep. 12, 2007) — Nearly 30 years after Nobel laureate Linus Pauling famously and controversially suggested that vitamin C supplements can prevent cancer, a team of Johns Hopkins scientists have shown that in mice at least, vitamin C - and potentially other antioxidants - can indeed inhibit the growth of some tumors ¯ just not in the manner suggested by years of investigation.

The conventional wisdom of how antioxidants such as vitamin C help prevent cancer growth is that they grab up volatile oxygen free radical molecules and prevent the damage they are known to do to our delicate DNA. The Hopkins study, led by Chi Dang, M.D., Ph.D., professor of medicine and oncology and Johns Hopkins Family Professor in Oncology Research, unexpectedly found that the antioxidants' actual role may be to destabilize a tumor's ability to grow under oxygen-starved conditions. Their work is detailed this week in Cancer Cell.

"The potential anticancer benefits of antioxidants have been the driving force for many clinical and preclinical studies," says Dang. "By uncovering the mechanism behind antioxidants, we are now better suited to maximize their therapeutic use."

"Once again, this work demonstrates the irreplaceable value of letting researchers follow their scientific noses wherever it leads them," Dang adds.

The authors do caution that while vitamin C is still essential for good health, this study is preliminary and people should not rush out and buy bulk supplies of antioxidants as a means of cancer prevention.
The Johns Hopkins investigators discovered the surprise antioxidant mechanism while looking at mice implanted with either human lymphoma (a blood cancer) or human liver cancer cells. Both of these cancers produce high levels of free radicals that can be suppressed by feeding the mice supplements of antioxidants, either vitamin C or N-acetylcysteine (NAC).

However, when the Hopkins team examined cancer cells from cancer-implanted mice not fed the antioxidants, they noticed the absence of any significant DNA damage. "Clearly, if DNA damage was not in play as a cause of the cancer, then whatever the antioxidants were doing to help was also not related to DNA damage," says Ping Gao, Ph.D, lead author of the paper.

That conclusion led Gao and Dang to suspect that some other mechanism was involved, such as a protein known to be dependent on free radicals called HIF-1 (hypoxia-induced factor), which was discovered over a decade ago by Hopkins researcher and co-author Gregg Semenza, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Program in Vascular Cell Engineering. Indeed, they found that while this protein was abundant in untreated cancer cells taken from the mice, it disappeared in vitamin C-treated cells taken from similar animals.

"When a cell lacks oxygen, HIF-1 helps it compensate," explains Dang. "HIF-1 helps an oxygen-starved cell convert sugar to energy without using oxygen and also initiates the construction of new blood vessels to bring in a fresh oxygen supply."

Some rapidly growing tumors consume enough energy to easily suck out the available oxygen in their vicinity, making HIF-1 absolutely critical for their continued survival. But HIF-1 can only operate if it has a supply of free radicals. Antioxidants remove these free radicals and stop HIF-1, and the tumor, in its tracks.

The authors confirmed the importance of this "hypoxia protein" by creating cancer cells with a genetic variant of HIF-1 that did not require free radicals to be stable. In these cells, antioxidants no longer had any cancer-fighting power.

The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Authors on the paper are Dean Felsher of Stanford; and Gao, Huafeng Zhang, Ramani Dinavahi, Feng Li, Yan Xiang, Venu Raman, Zaver Bhujwalla, Linzhao Cheng, Jonathan Pevsner, Linda Lee, Gregg Semenza and Dang of Johns Hopkins.

Adapted from materials provided by Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

CURING ALCOHOLISM NATURALLY

Dr. Carolyn Dean, MD, ND and
Elissa Meininger
November 17, 2005
NewsWithViews.com

One of the most satisfying things about the natural healing arts is that when you are thoroughly committed to its principles, you discover a contentment you can never find in modern medicine. Natural healing is about making people whole. It’s about arranging all the elements of your life to be as supportive as possible in all ways so that when you pass from this life, you do so at peace with yourself and the world around you. It’s not about fighting off the evils of disease or postponing the grim reaper no matter what the cost. And it certainly isn’t about diagnosing some disease and declaring yourself a victim of that disease, a label you must carry through life like a scarlet letter branded on your forehead.

The worst part of having a drinking problem is giving the behavior a name with the implication that once you have been branded an alcoholic, the next unspoken thought is “always an alcoholic”. Softening this branding by claiming those who have stopped drinking are “recovering” alcoholics, is just sliding into another form of discrimination, believing that we are nothing more the diseases we suffer and are life-long victims.

The plain fact of the matter is that all of us have issues that involve emotional, spiritual and physical components. We all need to establish the parameters of how we shall live out our lives. Those of us who want to maximize our lives learn to wrestle with, in a positive manner, those issues which make life less than perfect. To claim that we are all victims of disease or victims of situations that scar us for life is about feeling sorry for ourselves and not embracing life to the fullest.

A good example of how not to fall into this trap is something my NewsWithViews.com writing partner, Elissa, experienced. She was so poisoned by mercury from her dental amalgams, she was in pain for months on end, trying to detox it from her system. Pain killers were out of the question, and when her spirits were particularly low, she’d muster what little sense of humor she had, call her naturopath and say, “Skip the rest of the herbs, send the hemlock”. In return, knowing that she was at the end of her rope emotionally, he, being a true blue naturopath of the best kind, would ask her, “What is the gift?” This was a signal for her to embrace her suffering so she could fully examine the lessons pain and suffering could teach her about the value of life, the learning of patience, and other deeply spiritual issues, so that when the suffering was over, she would be a much wiser person, more ready to really live life to the fullest.

How many of us have known people who have suffered a great deal and have become incredibly wonderful people? How many of us have taken the trouble to surround ourselves with a positive support system and how many of us have arranged to have good things come our way because we have become positive thinkers and doers? These are all important issues that when we are caught in the throws of suffering, might be worth thinking about.

When I suggested to Elissa that we provide information from my colleagues in Orthomolecular Medicine about how they successfully treat alcoholism through nutrition, Elissa quickly pointed out that having been trained in Transactional Analysis back in the 1970’s, she was well aware that TA practitioners were not into naming diseases, either, and, in fact, didn’t consider alcoholism a disease at all.

Created by Eric Berne, MD, Transactional Analysis is a system of analyzing people’s patterns of behavior. It became the first of several therapeutic models that is particularly adaptable to self-help by lay people. Central to its core philosophy is that the client has the capacity to change and that the teacher-therapist is largely there to assist the client in taking charge of his/her own healing. In allopathic psychiatry and similar therapies, the therapist’s role is to diagnose a “disease” and be the authority figure who helps the “patient” become more well adjusted, though rarely healed.

When it was introduced in the 1960’s, TA revolutionized our understanding of what really goes on during our most basic social interactions. Best selling books such as “Games People Play”, “I’m OK, You’re OK”, “Success Through Transactional Analysis”, and “Born to Win” were on everyone’s coffee tables and the concepts of TA was quickly adopted into common usage. Everyone was analyzing “games”, discussing “life-scripts”, giving and receiving positive “strokes” and making jokes about who was more “OK” than somebody else.

Back then Elissa would have been delighted to add to her TA knowledge information about nutritional approaches that support the health of people who’d been trashed out by too much alcohol. She pointed out that to a TA counselor, the goal is to teach the client about the principles and practical methods of clarifying true emotions, develop useful information about how to run you own life, clean up old baggage from the past without going on what she calls an archeological expedition to rehash how much you hate your mother or other old anger that has yet to be resolved. Establishing a good diet to improve and maintain better health would certainly be a major part of such a health-promoting plan of action. In addition, it can improve a person’s state of mind, as malnourishment can lead to depression and other emotional imbalances, not to mention muddled thinking.

Sorting out the various elements of how a person came to have problems with alcohol is something TA counselors have had a great deal of success with because so many of the issues involved, are basically reviewing all the elements of a person’s life that may need to be updated. In fact, most people, once they understand TA, go over a checklist every now and again to keep on target to make sure they are maximizing their lives based on constantly updated information.

Since discussions about Transactional Analysis, and how to use it to deal with alcohol issues can get complicated in a short column like ours, Elissa suggests that readers interested in learning more about it, might like to read two books by TA’s premier alcohol treatment expert, Claude Steiner. Even though written in the 1970’s they are

1, Games Alcoholics Play: The Analysis of Life Scripts – (Random House, 1974)
2, Healing Alcoholism – originally published by Grove Press in 1971 – Now available as a free download

A book that I recommend about the nutritional approach to alcoholism is Food and Behavior by Barbara Reed Stitt. Barbara was one of the first parole officers in the country who put her charges on a good diet and saved most of them from further jail time. Knowing that diet can change criminal behavior should give you some indication of the power of good nutrition. It should also prepare you for the following Treatment Protocol for Alcoholism from Dr. Abram Hoffer, who, along with Linus Pauling is the father of orthomolecular medicine.

We include the full press release of July 1, 2005 from the Orthomolecular News Service.

How to Practice Medicine Without A License

New Book: The Vitamin C Foundation's Co-Founder has written

Copyright 2008 by Owen Fonorow. Press ReleaseBook Web Site Forum Discussion... The book covers the fifty-plus year history of the vitamin C theory of heart disease as well as the 12-year history of the so-called Pauling-therapy®.

Heart patients who decided to follow Linus Pauling's advice recovered in about 30 days. Many experienced significant relief in as little as ten days. These recoveries only occur after these former patients adopted the Pauling-therapy®, usually without their doctor's knowledge or consent. The book contains Pauling's specific detailed vitamin C and lysine dosage recommendations.

These recommendations that have helped thousands of heart patients overcome their disease. The reasons that the therapy may not work for everyone are also explored. The book could have been appropriately titled Chronic Scurvy, which is a more accurate description of the cardiovascular disease process. Look for details [Here] when this First-ever Vitamin C Foundation Book becomes available.

ORTHOMOLECULAR MEDICINE NEWS SERVICE

"It is a matter of common knowledge that any processing that foods undergo serves to make them more harmful than unprocessed foods." (McDonald's Corporation legal statement, shown in the documentary "Supersize Me")

The DOCTOR YOURSELF NEWSLETTER (Vol. 5, No. 2 for January 5, 2005)

"Free of charge, free of advertising, and free of the A.M.A." Written and copyright 2004 by Andrew W. Saul of http://www.doctoryourself.com/ , which welcomes 1.5 million visitors
annually. Commercial use of the website or the contents of this Newsletter is strictly prohibited.

ORTHOMOLECULAR MEDICINE NEWS SERVICE

My long-time readers have likely taken notice that the DOCTOR YOURSELF Newsletter is now a monthly. Yes, after five years of twice- monthly publication, I am giving a nod to the reality of some 30,000 hits a day at the http://www.doctoryourself.com/ website. There is only so much
time in a day.

The good news: I will continue to assail your ears about every four weeks or so with my edifying editorials and health hints. And, there is still NO CHARGE for the Newsletter. (To subscribe to the Doctor Yourself Newsletter:

newsletter-subscribe@doctoryourself.com )
Here's the really good news: With my copious new free time, I am beginning another project: the ORTHOMOLECULAR MEDICINE NEWS SERVICE. Like the Associated Press or Reuters, OMNS is a wire-service style news feed directed to members of the press, radio and TV news
media.

We have authoritative scientific clout and plan to use it. The OMNS editorial board consists of:

Abram Hoffer, M.D.
Hugh D. Riordan, M.D.
Harold Foster, Ph.D.
Bradford Weeks, M.D.

I see the creation of the Orthomolecular Medicine News Service as an increasingly necessary step to counter the pharmaceutically-biased factoids and vitamin misinformation that the media seem ever so ready to accept uncritically. The recent allegedly-negative E and C studies bear this out. (http://www.doctoryourself.com/safety.html/ )

Now with many hundreds of media email addresses, both newspaper and TV, we will shortly go ahead with a mass e-mail press release and inaugural announcement.

YES, YOU TOO MAY SUBSCRIBE TO THE ORTHOMOLECULAR NEWS SERVICE, free of charge. To do so, you will need to promptly send a blank email to omns-subscribe@doctoryourself.com . (Requests to other addresses, such as my regular email address, will not be processed.)

ASCORBATE: THE SCIENCE OF VITAMIN C
"It's not what we don't know that harms us, but what we do know that ain't so." (Eubie Blake, 1883-1983)

What is it about a little left-handed molecule of six carbons, six oxygens, and eight hydrogens that ticks off so many in the medical community? Maybe it's cases like this one: Ray, a health professional I know, had an 11-month old son who was very sick for over a week. No one, and I mean no one, in their family had had any sleep in a long time.

They were up night after night with this child, who had a high fever, glazed watery eyes, tons of thick watery mucus and labored breathing. The child would not sleep, and did little else but cry. The baby was under the care of a pediatrician, who, in the infant's eleven months on earth, had already prescribed twelve rounds of some very serious antibiotics. That they clearly were not working was all too apparent to Ray, who out of desperation decided to try something he previously had been taught to not try: bowel tolerance quantities of oral ascorbate.

Ray and his wife gave their baby some vitamin C about every 15 minutes. As a result, the baby
was noticeably improved in a matter of hours, and slept through the night. With frequent doses continuing, the child was completely well in 48 hours. Ray calculated that the baby had received just over 2,000 mg vitamin C per kilogram body weight per day. This is even more than what Dr. Frederick Robert Klenner customarily ordered for sick patients. Remarkably, at 20,000 milligrams of vitamin C/day, that 20-pound baby never had diarrhea. With such a little body, you have to marvel at where all of it was going. Of course, it is the opinion of those who promulgate the US RDA and related nutritional mythology that almost all of that baby's vitamin C went uselessly into the toilet. Ray and his wife would tell you differently. They would say
that their sick child soaked it up like a sponge, and then promptly got better.

For the layman unable to obtain intravenous vitamin C, one of the most important parts of Hickey and Roberts' new book, Ascorbate: The Science of Vitamin C, is its attention to oral administration, divided dosing, absorption, and vitamin C retention time in the bloodstream. With simple graphs and uncomplicated language, the authors illustrate 1) how high oral
doses of vitamin C yield higher blood levels of the vitamin, and 2) how dividing the oral doses maintains those higher levels. Although initially seeming almost too obvious to mention, these are not self-evident concepts. Government-based intake standards such as the RDA hinge on
ignoring them.

Hickey and Roberts zero in on this serious public health error. Their critical analysis of research studies purporting to justify a mere 100 or 200 mg/day ascorbate dose is worthy of Linus Pauling himself. Dr. Roberts says: "Stressed and even mildly ill people can tolerate 1,000 times more vitamin C, implying a change in biochemistry that was ignored in creating the
RDA. The RDA concept does not differentiate between short and long- term effects of deprivation.

The possibility that sub-clinical scurvy causes chronic disease has enormous implications for health. In setting the RDA, unsubstantiated risks of taking too much vitamin C have been accorded great importance, whereas the risks of not taking enough have been ignored. Real scientists understand that 'no scientific proof' is a fancy way of saying 'we don’t like this idea.' Furthermore, there is no clear mechanism for the RDA to be modified when new scientific evidence emerges."

Ascorbate: The Science of Vitamin C is a compellingly written, fast-paced inspection of belief-based bias that permeates the scientific method. It is not a tirade; Hickey and Roberts simply tell it the way it is. They are well qualified to do so. Steve Hickey has a PhD in Medical Biophysics from the University of Manchester, and spent about ten years in research at the
Manchester Medical School and associated hospitals. Interestingly, he had initially trained as a biologist specializing in pharmacology, later switching to biomechanics and medical physics. In addition to degrees in physiology and computer science, Hilary Roberts' University of Manchester PhD was on the effects of early life malnutrition. She spent ten years in research
and teaching at the university.

When asked how he and his coauthor came to write the book, Dr. Hickey said: "Since Linus Pauling's death, there seemed to be a great deal of misinformation. The NIH had performed some questionable experiments and were making the apparently ridiculous statement that blood plasma and tissues became saturated with low doses of vitamin C. There was no mainstream research on high doses and the establishment was making wild extrapolations from their low dose data. We could not see how a clinical trial with 200 mg of vitamin C, for example, could be used to suggest that higher doses were not effective. The work of physicians like Robert Cathcart, Archie Kalokerinos and Abram Hoffer intrigued us. The reported effects, especially of intravenous vitamin C, were astounding. It was difficult to find any reason to explain the lack of scientific follow-up. We had friends and relatives that were sick or dying from diseases that
high dose vitamin C was claimed to cure. Eventually we felt we had no choice but to write the book."

Dr. Roberts adds: "Most RDA standards are based on data which was not measured in actual experiments on real people. Even the small amount of data from the 19–30 year old subjects, who were measured, is based on neutrophils, a white blood cell type that is known to have unusual vitamin C biochemistry, along with an exceptional ability to pump the vitamin into
itself. Neutrophils have ascorbate levels from 25-60 times that of the surrounding plasma. This cell type is not a reliable model for the whole body."

Additional topics discussed in Ascorbate: The Science of Vitamin C include infectious disease, oxidation and illness, the safety of vitamin C, and a presentation of the authors' dynamic flow model of continual vitamin C-mediated tissue reduction. The book contains substantial sections
devoted to cardiovascular disease, with the welcome inclusion of an efficient discussion of the roles of vitamin E and lysine. Two excellent chapters on cancer take the starch right out of the Mayo Clinic "refutations" of the Pauling/Cameron vitamin C studies. The authors state that Dr.
Charles "Moertel's switch to oral does would clearly have biased the results" even though Pauling "stated clearly that intravenous doses are more effective than oral doses and explained the reasons for the difference."

Ascorbate: The Science of Vitamin C contains 575 references, and especially good ones. Though not alphabetized, all are keyed to the text with numbered footnotes. For a book this important, the index could be and should be more detailed. A glossary is included for the general reader.
All will enjoy the well-selected epigrams that form the chapter lead-in quotes.

The authors expert command of their topic has enabled them to successfully encompass an enormous, and enormously important, subject. To make a 216-page book this comprehensive, and also so exceptionally comprehensible as well, is no small achievement.

I wish I'd had a book of this caliber back in the 1970's when my kids were infants. I raised my children all the way into college without a single dose of any antiviral, antihistamine, or antibiotic. What they did get were megadoses of vitamin C. We, like so many other parents, learned the
principles of vitamin C therapy (quantity, frequency, and duration) at our kids' bedsides at three in the morning. Now, the pioneering work of megascorbate orthomolecular physicians has been concisely summarized and very skillfully explained in Ascorbate: The Science of Vitamin C. It is a thorough, up to date and very readable analysis of what, to some, may still appear to be a controversial topic.

Those who use it know that taking enough C results in three C's: patient comfort, low cost, and parental control. Without necessitating the use of invasive technology, nor the trauma of hospitalization, parents can regain confidence and mastery over illness to a degree that they might never have thought possible. For this reason, vitamin C therapy will, at least in
some quarters, continue be decried and denounced as irresponsible. It takes some real ego strength for a parent to stand firm and say, "This is what I am going to do: I am going to follow the Klenner/Pauling/Cathcart vitamin C protocol." Hickey and Roberts' review of vitamin C research is a solid buttress that makes such a stance possible. No bias or belief system
can withstand their first-rate presentation of the safety and effectiveness of megadoses of ascorbate.

Hickey S and Roberts H. Ascorbate: The science of vitamin C. 2004. ISBN 1-4116-0724-4. Morrisville, NC: Lulu.com. www.lulu.com/ascorbate NEW REVIEW of DOCTOR YOURSELF: Natural Healing that Works "Take Charge of Your Own Health"

Review by Beatrice Trum Hunter, in the Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients

Several recently published books deal with subjects that emphasize the importance of an individual taking charge of health practices and decisions. . . The illnesses and health problems discussed in Doctor Yourself: Natural Healing that Works are presented in alphabetical order,
and include acid reflux, allergies, hemorrhoids, sleep disorders, and vaccinations, among many others. According to Andrew Saul, many diseases can be treated with safe, inexpensive, and drugless approaches. He writes conversationally, interspersing protocols with personal
experiences and case stories. Take psoriasis, an intractable condition. Try a complete change of diet, with fresh foods, vegetable juices, lecithin, and vitamins including extra vitamin D, instead of the palliative ointments and lotions. For additional information on the scientific studies supporting the protocols. Dr. Saul refers readers to DoctorYourself.com website with
more than 4000 references.

Doctor Yourself: Natural Healing that Works, by Andrew, Saul, PhD.

(oversized quality paperback, 241 pages, bibliography, index, 2003) [from the Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients, #253-254, May 2004, p 132. http://www.townsendletter.com/ / Telephone (360)385-6021.] Editor's Note: This particular review was a special treat for me. Beatrice Trum Hunter's NATURAL FOODS COOKBOOK (New York: Pyramid, 1961) was one of the very first health books I read. (It is reviewed at http://www.hoboes.com/html/Diner/revue/naturalfoods.shtml) I was therefore most honored to have made her list of recommended books. Incidentally, the Townsend Letter also very favorably reviewed Doctor Yourself in the Aug-Sept 2004 issue. The review is posted at
http://www.doctoryourself.com/townsend.html . Additional reviews of my book are posted at http://www.doctoryourself.com/saulbooks.html/

TO ORDER AN AUTOGRAPHED COPY of DOCTOR YOURSELF:
Natural Healing that Works, please go to http://www.doctoryourself.com/order.html/

FREE ANTIVIRUS SOFTWARE
There is no longer any excuse to not have the latest and most recent, and
I mean this morning's, antivirus protection. With AVG Free Edition
Antivirus software, such protection is free and updates are, too. I have
used this excellent, downloadable, and totally free of charge program for
years:
http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/
(You can also go to http://www.grisoft.com )

FIRM FLUORIDE FACTS
Please especially note the sources of these statements.
"THERE IS NO EVIDENCE THAT FLUORIDE IS AN ESSENTIAL
NUTRIENT FOR HUMANS." (Physicians' Desk Reference)
http://www.pdrhealth.com/drug_info/nmdrugprofiles/nutsupdrugs/flu_0109.shtml

FLUORIDE IS NOT APPROVED BY THE U.S. FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION http://www.cm-life.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/12/06/41b3e6ab68a3c

("CITY REMOVES FLUORIDE FROM WATER. The City of Mount Pleasant (Michigan) followed the will of its resident-voters and began removing fluoride from its water supply. . . (City) ordinance states anything added to the city water must be approved by the Food and Drug
Administration, and fluoride is not.")

FLUORIDE DOES NOT WORK
California is 28% fluoridated; Hawaii is 9% fluoridated. These states are tied for the lowest rate of tooth loss in the USA. On the other hand, Kentucky is 100% fluoridated and has the highest toothless population of older adults.

(http://www.latimes.com/features/health/medicine/la-me-health2jan02,1,2990789.story?coll=la-health-medicine)

CORRECTION: My review of Pottenger's Cats, in the December, 2004 Newsletter (posted at http://www.doctoryourself.com/news/v5n1.txt ) omitted rightful mention of the Selene River Press (http://www.seleneriverpress.com/), publisher and distributor of health books.
They kindly provided me with the review copy of Pottenger's Cats.

VITAMIN E WITCH HUNT
by Michael Fumento
http://www.fumento.com/nutr/vitamine.html
Less than two months ago I debunked a report in the Lancet medical journal claiming antioxidants slightly increase your chance of dying, rather than reducing it as most researchers believe. Now I'm writing about a report that says the same thing about a specific antioxidant, vitamin E. Why are these pills being persecuted? Among the similarities of the earlier report and this one, authored by researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, is that the mainstream media accepted both without question. Both times the researchers smugly declared their work to be the final word on the subject, though both reports were, as the vitamin E one
admitted, 'a qualitative departure from previous findings.'

Since a good scientist knows no single report ever proves anything, we know these weren't good scientists. In fact, they have less in common with Johns Hopkins than Matthew Hopkins - England's infamous 'Witch-finder General.'
Consider the vitamin E paper, published in The Annals of Internal Medicine (full citation at http://www.doctoryourself.com/safety.html ). It analyzed 19 clinical trials between 1993 and 2004, involving 136,000 people in all. These were combined into what's called a 'meta-analysis,'
which showed no overall increase in deaths. But at high levels, defined as above 400 international units (IUs) per day, the researchers insisted 'vitamin E supplements may increase (deaths) and should be avoided.'
A glaring problem with the report is that there have been far more than 19 vitamin E trials since 1993, and one way the pack was whittled down was by excluding all studies reporting fewer than 10 deaths. The witch-hunters weren't about to interrogate witnesses who might keep the accused from a visit to the gallows.
Also, if 'more is worse,' why did the two studies that used the highest dose, 2,000 IUs per day, indicate fewer deaths among vitamin E users? Another problem with declaring this report to be the final word on vitamin E is that while clinical trials are important, epidemiological studies cannot be ignored. Yet ignored they were.

Thus there was no reference to the 1996 one from the National Institute of Aging that followed 11,000 elderly persons for seven years and found that the death rate for vitamin E users was a third that of non-users. Adding another antioxidant, vitamin C, cut fatalities even more.

A 1993 Harvard study of 40,000 male health professionals found those who took at least 100 IUs daily for two years had a third fewer cases of heart disease than those receiving no vitamin E supplements.
A Harvard study of 87,000 nurses that year found an even greater reduction in heart disease when comparing women who took the highest amount of vitamin E vs. those taking the lowest amount. Does this have you running in terror at the sight of a vitamin E capsule?

But what's with the supplement witch-hunt? Why the reports of vitamin E flying on broomsticks, and beta carotene casting hexes? "Unfortunately, there are some doctors who are biased against dietary supplements," says John Hathcock, vice president of Scientific & International Affairs at the D.C.-based Council for Responsible Nutrition. To an extent, this is understandable. For one, some supplements are worthless while a few have proved harmful. But you just can't lump 'eye of newt' in together with vitamin E or other antioxidants.
Mainstream medicine is also biased toward that which has formal FDA approval. You know, like Vioxx. And never mind the many supplements such as iron and iodine that have tacit FDA support but no formal approval.

Some doctors also fret that people will try to substitute supplements for good eating habits. 'We don't think that people need to take vitamin E supplements, that they get enough from the diet,' said the lead vitamin E prosecutor, associate professor Edgar Miller.
Yet the average American gets only about 10 IU daily. With some studies showing 2,000 IUs to be beneficial, dietary intake leaves us a bit shy of the mark. Anyway, those taking vitamins and other supplements also have the best diets.
The final explanation for vitamin-pill persecution is that medical journals are becoming increasingly sensationalist. Publishing articles contrary to popular wisdom is a cheap and easy way to get headlines. But there's no excuse for throwing a noose around the neck of good
science and healthful products.
[Reprinted with the kind permission of the author. Michael Fumento http://www.fumento.com/) is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute, syndicated columnist with Scripps Howard News Service and author of BioEvolution: How Biotechnology is Changing our World.]

The GERSON THERAPY MOVIE IS NOW ONLINE!
If you've been wanting to watch THE GERSON MIRACLE ever since I reviewed it the July 20 Doctor Yourself Newsletter (http://www.doctoryourself.com/gersontherapy2.html or http://www.doctoryourself.com/news/v4n16.txt), you are in luck. The entire movie, or any specific chapter you like, can now be viewed FREE OF CHARGE at www.gersonmiracle.org/movie.html . Grab some unsalted popcorn and pull up a chair.

BOOK REVIEW:
FAST FOOD NATION: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, by Eric
Schlosser.

Boston : Houghton Mifflin, 2001. ISBN: 0395977894
Why, why, why are so many, many, many people so sick, sick, sick? The main reason is staring right back at them from their dinner. It's the junk food, people. An ever-increasing proportion of our food is fast food. "In 1970, Americans spent about $6 billion on fast food; in 2000, they spent more than $110 billion," writes Eric Schlosser in his book Fast Food Nation. "They spend more on fast food than on movies, books, magazines, newspapers, videos, and recorded music - combined. . . On any given day in the United States, about one-quarter of the adult population visits a fast food restaurant." (p 3)

What does this mean to our health? Everything. Fast food is a high- additive, high-fat, high-meat, high-sugar, and high-salt diet. And what's just as bad, it's a low-fiber, low vitamin, low mineral diet to boot. Fast food is exactly the wrong way to eat.

And we are teaching our kids just how to do it . . .wrong. Chapter 2 discusses how the fast-food industry sells to kids, especially in schools. This is the last thing we need; a typical teenage boy already drinks 20 oz of soda a day. Indoctrination starts early: page 30 of Fast Food Nation shows a superb photo of Ronald McDonald speaking to a large room full of enraptured elementary schoolchildren. How can this be?
Because the cafeterias in so many of our school districts are for sale for the right price. The actual franchise income that any school district may get pales when compared to what fast food industry takes in. After all, says Schlosser, "A medium Coke that sells for $1.29 contains roughly 9 cents' worth of syrup."

Adults are to blame. We, not our kids, are the ones who allowed fast food in our schools. We are the ones who let Harlem Memorial Hospital contain its very own McDonald's. It is our money that enables McDonald's to open FIVE new restaurants every DAY. It is our U.S. Federal Communications Commission and our U.S. Federal Trade Commission that permit every American child to watch 10,000 television food ads every year. Are these ads for carrots? Not according to Yale professor Kelly Brownell, PhD., who says that 95% of TV food commercials promote candy, soft drinks and fast food.

Fast Food Nation is much more than a history of soda pop and the flipped burger. In Chapter 3, Schlosser takes us "Behind the Counter" to examine labor issues in the fast food biz. "No other industry in the United States has a workforce so dominated by adolescents," he writes. And teenagers work hard and they work cheap. Too cheap. "Increasing the federal minimum wage by a dollar (an hour) would add about two cents to the cost of a fast food hamburger." Fast Food Nations also explores "Why the Fries Taste Good" in Chapter 5, as well as the very real dangers for those who work at meat packing factories.

Your making a point to read the exceptionally well-written Fast Food Nation would be the perfect New Year's resolution. Here is some video encouragement to help you on your way as you change your lifestyle and fight to eat right:

DIET WARS
"Nobody ever got rich marketing self-control." That is my favorite quote from "Diet Wars," a recent PBS' Frontline presentation. If you missed this truly excellent program, you can still watch it online, for free, at
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/diet/view/

Privacy Statement:
We do not sell, and we do not share, our mailing list or your email address with anyone. We never send out advertisements of any kind. You may notice that there is no advertising at http://doctoryourself.com and no advertising in this newsletter. We have no financial connection with the supplement industry. We do not sell vitamins or other health products, except for Dr. Saul's books, which help fund these free public services.

AN IMPORTANT NOTE: This newsletter is not in any way offered as prescription, diagnosis nor treatment for any disease, illness, infirmity or physical condition. Any form of self-treatment or alternative health program
necessarily must involve an individual's acceptance of some risk, and no one should assume otherwise. Persons needing medical care should obtain it from a physician. Consult your doctor before making any health decision.

"DOCTOR YOURSELF" "DoctorYourself.com" and "Doctor Yourself Newsletter" are service marks of Andrew W. Saul. All rights reserved.
Copyright c 2005 and prior years Andrew W. Saul drsaul@doctoryourself.com . Permission to reproduce single copies of this newsletter FOR NON-COMMERCIAL, PERSONAL USE ONLY is hereby granted providing no alteration of content is made and authorship credit is
given.

HIGH DOSES OF INTRAVENOUS VITAMIN C FIGHT CANCER

Kathleen Doheny, The New York Times, Tues, Sept.13, 2005
"High doses of vitamin C administered intravenously can fight cancer -- at least in the laboratory, researchers report.

"(The study) examined the body's absorption of the nutrient and found that while oral intake does reach a saturation point, when you give doses intravenously they go through the roof in the blood and then they are cleared, said lead researcher Dr. Mark Levine (chief of the molecular and clinical nutrition section and senior staff physician, National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases). According to Levine, a 10 gram dose (10,000 milligrams) of vitamin C given intravenously produces bloodstream concentrations more than 25-fold higher than concentrations achieved from the same oral dose.

"Some antibiotics are poorly absorbed when given orally but fight infections effectively when given intravenously, and Levine and his team thought that might be the case with vitamin C and cancer. Working with cell lines in the laboratory, they used high doses of vitamin C that could only be achieved by IV administration.

At the highest concentration of ascorbic acid, if given intravenously, they don't touch normal cells and they kill lots of cancer cells. We don't know why, Levine said."

(Editor’s note: Yes, this is certainly good news, although it is not really "news" to most Doctor Yourself Newsletter readers. It is rather an official confirmation, one that has, finally, gotten the attention of the media. Even FOX news picked it up. As Gomer Pyle said, "Goll-y!")

WHY THE DELAY?
Commentary by Bill Sardi
"With a growing body of evidence mounting, National Institutes of Health (NIH) researchers recently conceded that intravenous vitamin C may be an effective treatment for cancer. Last year the same researchers reported a similar study but the news media failed to publish it.
"The latest study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, confirms the work of Nobel-Prize winner Linus Pauling who conducted cancer research in the 1970s with vitamin C. Dr. Pauling's studies were discredited at the time by poorly conducted research studies at the Mayo Clinic.

"NIH researchers made no mention of their earlier study in 2004 which showed that oral-dose vitamin C can achieve three times greater blood concentration than previously thought possible, a fact which negates the current Recommended Dietary Allowance for vitamin C. NIH researchers refuse to issue a retraction of their earlier flawed research which mistakenly claimed humans cannot benefit from high-dose oral vitamin C supplements."

More at http://www.knowledgeofhealth.com/
Also see: http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2005/09/13/cancer_intravenous_vitamin_c_effective_treatment.htm
Full citation:
Qi Chen, Michael Graham Espey , Murali C. Krishna, James B. Mitchell, Christopher P. Corpe, Garry R. Buettner, Emily Shacter, and Mark Levine. Pharmacologic ascorbic acid concentrations selectively kill cancer cells: Action as a pro-drug to deliver hydrogen peroxide to tissues. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 10.1073/pnas.0506390102
"Extracellular but not intracellular ascorbate mediated cell death, which occurred by apoptosis and pyknosis/necrosis . . . (T)hese data indicate that ascorbate at concentrations achieved only by i.v. administration may be a pro-drug for formation of H2O2, and that blood can be a delivery system of the pro-drug to tissues. These findings give plausibility to i.v. ascorbic acid in cancer treatment..."
This News release was provided by DOCTOR YOURSELF News (Vol. 5 , No. 13 for October, 2005)

Mental Disorders as Molecular Disease, Linus Pauling

Mental Disorders as Molecular Disease, Linus Pauling

Orthomolecular medicine describes the practice of preventing and treating disease

Orthomolecular medicine describes the practice of preventing and treating disease by providing the body with optimal amounts of substances which are natural to the body.

The term "orthomolecular" was first used by Linus Pauling in a paper he wrote in the journal Science in 1968. The key idea in orthomolecular medicine is that genetic factors affect not only the physical characteristics of individuals, but also to their biochemical milieu.

Biochemical pathways of the body have significant genetic variability and diseases such as atherosclerosis, cancer, schizophrenia or depression are associated with specific biochemical abnormalities which are causal or contributing factors of the illness.

Want to learn more?

The following essays give a more detailed overview of the nature, efficacy and history of orthomolecular medicine.
Principles That Identify Orthomolecular Medicine.by R. Kunin, MD
On the Orthomolecular Environment of the Mind.by Linus Pauling, Ph.D.
Orthomolecular Psychiatryby Linus Pauling, Ph.D.
Orthomolecular Medicine - Revisited.by Ray C. Wunderlich, Jr., M.D.

HIGH DOSES OF INTRAVENOUS VITAMIN C FIGHT CANCER

Kathleen Doheny, The New York Times, Tues, Sept.13, 2005
"High doses of vitamin C administered intravenously can fight cancer -- at least in the laboratory, researchers report.

"(The study) examined the body's absorption of the nutrient and found that while oral intake does reach a saturation point, when you give doses intravenously they go through the roof in the blood and then they are cleared, said lead researcher Dr. Mark Levine (chief of the molecular and clinical nutrition section and senior staff physician, National Institute of Diabetes & Digestive & Kidney Diseases). According to Levine, a 10 gram dose (10,000 milligrams) of vitamin C given intravenously produces bloodstream concentrations more than 25-fold higher than concentrations achieved from the same oral dose.

"Some antibiotics are poorly absorbed when given orally but fight infections effectively when given intravenously, and Levine and his team thought that might be the case with vitamin C and cancer. Working with cell lines in the laboratory, they used high doses of vitamin C that could only be achieved by IV administration.

At the highest concentration of ascorbic acid, if given intravenously, they don't touch normal cells and they kill lots of cancer cells. We don't know why, Levine said."

(Editor’s note: Yes, this is certainly good news, although it is not really "news" to most Doctor Yourself Newsletter readers. It is rather an official confirmation, one that has, finally, gotten the attention of the media. Even FOX news picked it up. As Gomer Pyle said, "Goll-y!")

WHY THE DELAY?
Commentary by Bill Sardi
"With a growing body of evidence mounting, National Institutes of Health (NIH) researchers recently conceded that intravenous vitamin C may be an effective treatment for cancer. Last year the same researchers reported a similar study but the news media failed to publish it.
"The latest study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, confirms the work of Nobel-Prize winner Linus Pauling who conducted cancer research in the 1970s with vitamin C. Dr. Pauling's studies were discredited at the time by poorly conducted research studies at the Mayo Clinic.

"NIH researchers made no mention of their earlier study in 2004 which showed that oral-dose vitamin C can achieve three times greater blood concentration than previously thought possible, a fact which negates the current Recommended Dietary Allowance for vitamin C. NIH researchers refuse to issue a retraction of their earlier flawed research which mistakenly claimed humans cannot benefit from high-dose oral vitamin C supplements."

More at http://www.knowledgeofhealth.com/
Also see: http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2005/09/13/cancer_intravenous_vitamin_c_effective_treatment.htm
Full citation:
Qi Chen, Michael Graham Espey , Murali C. Krishna, James B. Mitchell, Christopher P. Corpe, Garry R. Buettner, Emily Shacter, and Mark Levine. Pharmacologic ascorbic acid concentrations selectively kill cancer cells: Action as a pro-drug to deliver hydrogen peroxide to tissues. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 10.1073/pnas.0506390102

"Extracellular but not intracellular ascorbate mediated cell death, which occurred by apoptosis and pyknosis/necrosis . . . (T)hese data indicate that ascorbate at concentrations achieved only by i.v. administration may be a pro-drug for formation of H2O2, and that blood can be a delivery system of the pro-drug to tissues. These findings give plausibility to i.v. ascorbic acid in cancer treatment..."

This News release was provided by DOCTOR YOURSELF News (Vol. 5 , No. 13 for October, 2005)