Clinical Research

 ....those who chose gemcitabine-based chemotherapy survived more than three times as long (14.0 v 4.3 months) and had better quality of life than those who chose proteolytic enzyme treatment.

Andrew Vickers has written a series of articles on methodology of clinical trials of integrative medicine, including issues such as randomization, early phase clinical trials, accrual and quality of life assessment. All of these articles are now available open access (i.e. free-of-charge) via PubMed Central. Simply go to Medline(http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez)  and run the following search:  "J Soc Integr Oncol"[Journal] AND Vickers a[au] Click on an article that interests you to see the abstract, then click on “free author manuscript in PubMed Central” towards the top write for the free text.

CONTENT

1: Phase II designs...

Cancer patients should be made aware of the fact that botanical agents produce more complex effects than assumed, and may depress as well as enhance immune function.

Jinfukang did not alter the pharmacokinetics of docetaxel nor appear to affect survival in this study.

Some, but not all, botanicals purported to be immune stimulants had adjuvant activity in our model. PSK and Astragalus were surprisingly active and are being further fractionated to identify the most active adjuvant components.

Systematic review of randomised clinical trials with acupuncture, placebo acupuncture, and no acupuncture groups.

If you or loved one face surgery for colon cancer, you may want to consider adding massage and acupuncture to the usual care provided. Here's what a recent study recommends.

On the day after a day during which women practiced more yoga, they experienced significantly lower levels of pain and fatigue, and higher levels of invigoration, acceptance, and relaxation.

Personalized medicine is inherent to integrative oncology. An individualized holistic care plan provides optimum treatment for a cancer patient, using the best evidence from all treatment domains.

Huge disappointment: Selenium and Vitamin E fail to Prevent Prostate Cancer.

Can complementary therapies for cancer patients be evaluated by clinical trials?

Contrary to popular assumptions about the health benefits of green tea, researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) have found that the widely used supplement renders a cancer drug used to treat multiple myeloma and mantle cell lymphoma completely ineffective in treating cancer.

Acupuncture reduces symptoms after head and neck cancer surgery.