The patient can self-administer melatonin, coenzyme Q10, tocopherol succinate, and many other nutrients that have been shown to protect immune function and improve chemotherapy efficacy. These nutrients have saved the lives of numerous cancer patients in clinical trials. However, the administration of FDA-approved drugs is still necessary for many cancer patients, even though compounds such as melatonin have similar mechanisms of action. As many Foundation members know, there is an appalling lack of creativity in the medical establishment. We live in a distorted medical-legal culture in which creative doctors face the risk of incarceration, the loss of their medical licenses, and malpractice lawsuits for administering therapies that are not yet recognized by the establishment.
Doctors also suffer from the common human characteristic of being resistant to change.
Many alternative doctors also lack the expertise to administer toxic FDA-approved drugs, even though these drugs can be made less toxic when combined with innovative therapies the Foundation has discovered. The need for this type of Life Extension Medical Center became apparent when the Foundation initiated a pilot program to design individualized treatment regimens for cancer victims. These regimens were based upon new findings in conventional cancer journals, and were adapted to each patient. Regrettably, very few of the Foundation's recommendations were ever implemented, even though we provided the oncologists with articles from their own cancer journals. Please understand that we are not talking about nutritional therapies here.