here's my name is dr heidi weinhold and you are watching asked the nature of today's topic is nature of pathic support for people living with cancer and i am thrilled to introduce to you my guest and colleague dr john  shadyside welcome john thank you i hear it's a great to have you yeah joe what are some natural therapies that you incorporate in your practice when treating patients with cancer well i start off with dietary changes and i also include typically things like vitamin d certain mushroom extracts sometimes antioxidants depending upon whether they're appropriate for the patient ok carnitine a lot when people are really fatigued i find i find that that to be helpful john so you do feel that diet is important in the treatment of cancer in many many doctors don't put any stock  n the diet help that's right they do and how do you feel i think it's really important i think that's the fundamental thing to look at when you're a person it's either trying to prevent a recurrence or has cancer and i know that you know it's not given much weight but there's actually research that shows that for recurrence for event recurrence that patients with breast cancer for instance have a fifty percent reduction in recur if they consume at least five or more combined series of fruits and vegetables a day and exercise both i believe in that too and especially for for breast cancer things like  sprouts buck choice was chard all of those the dark leafy green vegetables those are often referred to as the super vegetables are the ones that i to you know usually recommend either one serving a day or maybe up to two servings a day which is just one cup cooked of those and you know i did read a study to about fiber and all those vegetables are high high sources of fiber but especially for breast cancer that they said thirty grams of fi a day decrease your risk for breast cancer and have young paired to another woman that had you know less than twenty twenty grams a day right so so that's very important and is there a particular diet that you is no not really particularly what i try to do is just see what kind of diet they have and what sort of things they're willing to work with ok and so i don't put them on a vegetarian diet or i don't put them on a vegan diet or i don't ask them to follow  particular gluten free or casein free diet ok what i do try and do though is to have them all in that red meat that's one change they typically do i think that's a good idea especially grilled meats you know like a lot of the grill compounds promote carcinogens and that makes a lot of sense and it's high in inflammation right do you do you believe in the correlation between information in the diet and cancer growth i think it helps promote cancer growth to have a more inflammatory diet in it has been correlated to increasing growth and breast cancer patients so you know normally dairy is substituted for like the lot of the high fiber foods so it in and it is it makes sense cruciferous vegetables because they have something called and all three carbonel and that helps to clear out excess estrogen and did just that i think there is a huge correlation but even though that  dairy may not be good for people living with cancer going through cancer treatment how do you feel about whey protein shakes well you should use those especially during cancer treatment for patients that have a loss of appetite and they have weight loss and so way protein has actually been shown to enhance natural killer cells and immune function and and so that helps the body fight the cancer rate and so you can though it is derived from dairy it has effect  as exacerbating so i feel the same way i feel that incorporating way protein drinks especially if they're on chemotherapy regimens it really does help with appetite they're easy to drink and they're satisfying it just it just helps maintain their their weight but i would put caution a lot of people will go over the counter and you know you can't trust all all protein drinks and especially some of these ones on the counter over the counter for promoting like weight lifting and if they have any other additives i tell them just to stay away from it because anything that would promote growth you don't want in somebody that's battling cancer melamine too has been a contaminant that has been been found in some way protein drinks so i kind of steer them towards there's a company called vital nutrients that i like a lot and they they make a really good way protein powder they use it a lot of cancer treatment centers of america but they actually check for melamine and they check for any additives and it's in this pure and it's really easy to do to digest and there's twenty twenty grams of  not well i typically use ginger for that and it's actually been shown to be useful for acute nausea more so than the late nights yet which means that not you that occurs right after treatment and it's best to then supplement it usually about a gram sometimes i have them also use it as a t ok so i told to go to a store by ginger root slice it up and make a little tea that sounds good they use some homeopathic says well in a common one that i use is homeopathic next and you can get that over the counter even have a giant eagle but in a low dose it can it can help  john do you find that the medical doctors you p m c are they are the open integrating natural therapies with some or i've had referrals from other physicians that m was what are the things that you teach i teach the basic medical sciences there you know anatomy physiology path elegy john or is there any evidence that using natural therapies 's some good studies you mention with with melatonin that that's another way that it's been shown to have some on static properties are helping to stop cancer growth and really really helpful for solid tumors like runs late like lung from that combination right recent studies haven't shown it to be as effective but again so there's a mix i think it's important to clarify you have to be careful on what chemotherapy regi regimens that person is is taking to you silly once one supplement isn't good for all types of cancer or every type of chemotherapy drug you really it should be tailored right they should see somebody like a trainee dramatic doctor who is trained in her drug interactions right to help guide them but often times i will use the struggle us in combination even with some other herbs allayed to kind of customize it and blend it so it's easier for them to take and in that can help even even just helping to boost their white blood cells of if they're down after good after going through chemotherapy i've i found that to be helpful you say that you do you do like using vitamin d in your practice  vitamin d levels so we get to see what they are that's wonderful and it's important for cancer patients so the treatment itself will lower vitamin d levels and they found that in order to maintain vitamin d levels or just increase them it has to about two thousand milligrams or two thousand or national units that is vitamin d a day ok less than that's not very effective for cancer patients that's that's good information and also i read somewhere too that heavier people may be actually have to have lower vitamin d levels so it so it does it does help to to actually test it in tailored towards that that individual do you feel that homeopathic remedies can help with with recovery for patients going through surgery well you know actually i don't use homeopathic medicine very much at all so i really can't speak to that ok they use a little bit actually i don't use it a prevent cancer and if there's a strong family history of the disease well there's a strong family history than well usually recommended terms of diet is to really choose a whole foods diet to really true void pesticides insecticides additives things like that in the diet again avoiding red meat as much as possible maybe think you know like fish again you have to watch the source of that  these these ionic foot bass and you know i just think it's complete nonsense you know that you know there it's chemistry salt water iron electricity it makes it makes rust and if anything they may be absorbing a little bit of iron then actually getting rid of of toxins in the body and yet there are so many people that claim to be nature pass her nature past the doctors because this profession is totally unregulated in the state and they're promoting this for cancer cancer therapy how do you feel about that i agree with you i think it's bogus idea to you know save people at home just to save your money here john we're go as an artist i led my high school team to two championships i am a valuable employee i have a career that i am passionate about what can you do what can you do like all young people youth with disabilities should grow of expecting to work and succeed for more information visit what can you do campaign dot org offer at the at the center for integrative medicine another cancer patients benefit from massage therapy you know it's helpful for relaxing and so that's available there  and there's a structural integration practitioner ok and there's also a chiropractor a while and then there's a person that does body mind therapies  several psychologists so it's a well rounded clinic and there are i think people can benefit from a lot of those different therapies i do too i think i think body work is so important in that touch and just help with stress because i think a lot of people going through cancer really do have even some body image issues and they just need that comfort that touch i think is so so healing so do treatment i think there's a lot to you know stress levels and the immune system you know they offer my fullest based stress reduction classes have yoga classes classes all those are program is in it's going to his fourth year and it is a novel major in an undergraduate program there are probably only seven scholars or universities in the entire country that have such a major and it is a major that focuses on couple material alternative medicine and so students will learn about the holistic approach of integrative nutrition a cupuncture traditional chinese medicine integrative women's health which you teach and love it body mind therapies as well as body based practices different types of massage or an allied or medicine even or an allied health fields like physician assistant studies p t physical therapy occupational therapy these are so it's an avenue for all of those different graduate studies i think it's a wonderful idea i think it's a great program because a lot of people there you know today i think the public is demanding that their health care practitioners have some knowledge and complimentary and alternative therapies a there's so many bright young people that they may not want to go into nature path of medicine but they do have an interest and they want to take some of this with them whatever field they go into so they are they are a physician assistants are nursing i think this is this is such a great great complement in this this is about a bachelor's degree right it's a bachelor of arts degree for your degree ok i and i also think it's interesting a lot of the students do it's almost like a thesis but they do research as part of their graduate maybe can describe a little bit or some of the projects that they're doing sure yeah so as part of child i'm so undergraduate program they have to do a tutorial in their senior year ok it's a four year project and so some of the students are looking at the benefits of meditation others are looking at the role of antioxidants and chemotherapy interactions others are looking at  holistic couple internal terms of treatments for autism and others are looking at a couple material terms of treatments for low back pain so it's you know it's very interesting i diverse do you think chatham will open enrollment and make the program yes i expect that to happen the university just announced that it's considering accepting men into the undergraduate program and going coed and so we'll see but it seems that it's on track are the decisions are final but they're looking at doing that in the fall of two thousand and fifteen ok so if there we're filming this in a school if there are students that are that are interested in learning more about the program how can they find out about this well they can send an e mail to me later to chatham dot edu or they can go on line and take a look at the undergraduate majors at chatham university's website ok and it has a description about the nature and it's a beautiful campus it's it's charming but it's it's tucked away  a bill right now there there is legislation that was sponsored by representative mark must and this bill would license nature path of doctors in the state of pennsylvania and you know the bill actually it passed the house of representatives overwhelmingly won sixty one to thirty three in favor of this legislation and now the bill sits in the senate professional licensure committee and a lot of the viewers that are watching this you know they can and i want to encourage them to write to their senators which would be senator matt smith and senator salo by who are both on this committee and we're trying to get this bill moved up for a vote but right now there's nothing in this state to educate people and in discern our training you know you you and i both went to we have an undergraduate a bachelor of arts degree and then move went on to complete a four year nature path medical program for grueling years all year round we learned now to me physiology biochemistry in laboratory diagnosis we had a past three days of board exams and ordered to be licensed and yet there's people at home that you know they can sit at home their computer without you know it was just a high school degree and they can go online and they can get a certificate in the mail and call themselves a nature path a doctor and it's confusing to the public and it puts the public at risk because they're searching someone like yourself who's actually integrated in a major hospital you know university of pittsburgh medical cent they're searching for people like you and they're getting confused by all these other people advertising themselves leave it advertise themselves as a board certified teacher path or nature path a doctor in this day it's legal to deal in because it's easy to do everybody does it but boy there's too much confusion and i hear it all the time and i even hear it from my patients you know they'll see a mail order nature path and they will actually discourage people from seeking conventional care for their cancer do you have you've found this to be true have you have you seen this in your practice how do you feel about the speech of legislation i think that this legislation is absolutely necessary  to pass and i agree with you that all the viewers should contact their senators and write a letter or email in favor of the legislation encouraging their senators to vote for it to get it out of the committe such a vast difference between people that are you know a correspondence school educated that your paths really have very little understanding of medical medicine of normal biology physiology we're really misleading people and you know i always work together with medical doctors with their patients i'm not the one you know i will not advocate to patients to you know stop their prescription medications and it's like that i work together with their medical sure i get angry at times about the fact that we're not licensed yet and that they don't recognize this difference and intil this is recognized our services will not be covered by insurance right the we don't get reimbursement for that and th just improves access to this type of care and there's actually there's a lot of rumors going around that you know licensure would prevent the sales of supplements and health food stores and that's not true there's nothing in this bill that would prevent the sale of you know herbs or that these supplements and retail stores or any other office any other you know chiropractor dr it just it would all it all it would do is recognize and protect the title so if you're interested in learning more about the integrated health studies program at chatham or making an appointment with dr laird at the u p m c center for integrated medicine please contact the phone number that's listed below thank you for