Massage is unlikely to be of harm. Theoretically, if one would rub a melanoma or a superficial sarcoma, one might think of cell spread as a theoretical possibility. Yet, in cancer patients malignant c ells...
I appreciate the contribution and the link to some information about Circulating Tumor Cells (CTC). Yet, I guess that CTC as a screening tool will run into the same sort of problems as I have mentione d...
Dear madam,
This question is to wide for an answer. A full answer is a whole book of medicine; and not a small book. There are too many varieties in malignant neoplasms, too many different loca tions...
A spontaneous remission.
We have studied cases like these. In virtually every cancer spontaneous remission may occur. Some say in 1 :10.000, but no one really knows. In renal cell carcinoma spo ntaneous...
Children should be told always how they have been conceived. If this was by a donor, children should have the opportunity to find the identity of the donor. It must be the choice of the child to inqui re...
Acute crisis, like you're in now, is not a bad sign. So, have it come as you do, don't go for anti-depressants or tranquilizers, and find yourself an experiential psychotherapist. Not because you're m entally...
Go to your doctor and ask for pain medication that won't make you sick. I don't know if or on NSAIDS (ibuprofen, naproxen and such) or a morphin like prescription. But left or right there should be so me...
There seems a good alternative, but now with medication. I've seen my wife treating various ADHD patients with what we call kinesiology. This, in my view, is acturally a type of bodily oriented psycho therapy...
Dear collegue,
Basically, we don't know if they are stored in the brain at all.
We do know that brain function and particular areas like the hippocampal are important for memory storage; we...
Dear Maurice,
With regard to mechanismn, I believe that most of it, we don't know. A lot of attention has been given to activation of the cortisol axis in tumor ptomotion. Corticosteroids decre ase...
Rogentine showed in 1979 that melanoma patients, who seemed 'less adjusted' to their diagnosis, had beter survival (80% after one year) than patients who seemed 'well adjusted' (30% suurvival after on e...
I appreciate the question. Apart from my work as psycho-oncologist/ psychodramatist, I work a lot as an Emergency Physician and I am co-founder of the Dutch Society for Emergency Medicine. From studen t...
Pap smear has a sensitivity around 50 %. So, half of people with cervical cancer will be missed: the test comes back normal, and yet cervical cancer may be there. Human Papilloma virus DNA (HPV DNA) testing...
With regard to case 1: you came up with the point of abandonment (by the doctor), I've only commented upon it.
In the mean time, I have realised that the conlfict would go different. if the pat ient...
It is not the doctor who terminates the relationship, it is the patient who does so. And if the doctor would not leave, he is acting against the law, by continuing treatment against the patient's will The...
Dear collegue, dear Maurice,
There really is not an ethical dilemma here, in Case 1. It is against the law to treat a patient, who is able to decide etc, against his will. This patient does not want...
Case 1 is an easy one: if the patient is legally considered a mentally normal person, able to understand the situation, to oversee consequences and to express his will, then it is forbidden to treat h em...
Dear madam,
Rabbit meat from wild hunt used to be put away in the cellar for a couple of days to 'noble'. It actually meant that some decay took place over a couple of days on the outside of th e...
Who should be screened? No one, except some with a very high genetic risk, like BRCA in breast cancer.
Francis and Ritz are right.
Over the decades we have seen that the price is too hi gh...
Dear collegue,
There has been a famous study, comparing real arthroscopy with (placebo) fake arthroscopy. I recall, that in the latter, patients were anesthesized inidentical ways, and only min or...
Dear young madam,
There are no three types of hearth rythm, but there are many. Maybe the idea of three refers to Sinus rythm, atrial and AV node rythms, and ventricular onset rythms. Possibly three...
The most important teaching point is to find out why it was given at all.
There is an incredable overuse of benzodiazepines like valium and sleeping tablets. If 'benzo 's' are used to cover u p...
A recent analysis showed that effects of anti-depressants like cipramil are clinically irrelevant. When their effects are studied, you find a small effect that is 'statistically significant; but it is that...
Dear Carolyn
I appreciate your comment. Polymeal was not just a joke and did cause a serious discussion in the official Dutch medical journal. The meal was the result of a fairly serious meta-a nalysis...
Don't forget the other ways to lower cardiovascular risk. The polymeal is supposed to prevent up to 75 % of all cardiovascular disease. So, if you don't succeed one way, try the other.
http://e n...
dear mrs Parisher, '
"dead cancer"is not a very normal term in medicine. Most likely it refers to visible remants of a tumour that seem to be without living tumorcells; one might think of fibrot ic...
Dear Sir,
Basically, I agree with my colleague Abramsom that one should visit an oncologist, preferably one that is specialised in myeloma; in Holland that would likely be an hemato-oncologist. Specialised...