Californians demand integrative care for cancer treatment

Friday, June 15, 2012 by: Len Saputo
Tags: cancer, integrative medicine, California

(NaturalNews) It is a felony in the State of California for a medical doctor to treat cancer with anything except surgery, chemotherapy, or radiation. It is punishable by fine, loss of license, and imprisonment! This means that the citizens of California are being denied services to treat cancer if they are not in the mainstream bag of tools. Thousands of cancer patients who live in California are forced to leave the state to obtain the treatment they want and need in neighboring states such as Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico where it is legal, or travel out of the country to Mexico, Germany, Switzerland or many other places. Most people with cancer cannot afford to do this.

It is an outrage that anyone is denied cancer treatment that is scientifically grounded but illegal. The turf war between oncologists and CAM practitioners is the focus of attention rather than finding ways to integrate safe therapies that could help people with cancer, especially when the treatments available don't work. It is a sad scenario when treatment success in stage 4 cancers is only about 2% for a 5 year survival with conventional therapies and there are no other options because of partisan laws. There are many MDs in California who have the knowledge and skill to help many of these patients with five year survival rates that can be as high as 30-50% at 5 years, but are unwilling to offer it for fear of serious legal action from their medical board.

Fortunately, there is an organization that is working to change this partisan law that must be to the liking of the pharmaceutical companies that make billions of dollars from treatments that are all too often outrageously expensive, ineffective, and treacherous. It is called California Citizens for Health Freedom (CCFHF), and it is headed by Frank Cuny. Achievements of CCFHF include licensing of naturopaths in California and setting up their own board, passing legislation making it legal for MDs to practice integrative medicine in California so long as they don't dissuade patients from mainstream treatments and they don't cause them harm, and making it possible for midwives to practice in the State of California. CCFHF has also blocked considerable legislation that would have made nutritional medicine illegal, and has come to the rescue of many MDs who practice complementary and alternative medicine and are threatened by their medical board with loss of license for doing so. It is now a legal requirement that the California Medical Licensing Board review all cases against MDs with board members that have training in the field involved in each case.

You can learn more about CCFHF at www.citizenshealth.org, or go to NaturalNews.tv at http://www.youtube.com to view a short video explaining the need for integrative cancer care and the bill that will be presented to the California Legislature in the coming months. If you want to make a donation to this organization, it would be tax deductible and much appreciated. We simply cannot withhold scientifically based treatments for cancer because of turf wars or from partisan laws that favor the pharmaceutical industry and conventional oncologists.

Len Saputo, MD
www.DoctorSaputo.com

About the author:
Len Saputo, MD is board certified in internal medicine and is in private practice focused on integrative, holistic, person-centered care at the Health Medicine Center (http://www.doctorsaputo.com/a/health-medicin...) in Walnut Creek, CA. Dr. Saputo is the founder of the Health Medicine Forum (http://www.doctorsaputo.com/a/health-medicin...) and the author, with Byron Belitsos, of the Nautilus Gold Award winning book, "A Return to Healing: Radical Health Care Reform and the Future of Medicine" (http://doctorsaputo.com/a/a-return-to-healin...). He and his wife, Vicki, have hosted KEST radio's "Prescriptions for Health" show that airs daily for more than a decade.

Dr. Saputo's highly interactive health and wellness website www.DoctorSaputo.com has more than 1500 audio and video media files that are organized and targeted to address your specific and unique health issues. Take the free Health and Wellness Assessment Survey on the home page and experience how his surveys on a wide range of health care conditions provide immediate personalized integrative suggestions for your health challenges!