The Integrative Oncology Experience
Today, just some closing thoughts on the experiences of Maria Claudia White that I have been chronicling over the past several posts. Maria Claudia’s complementary therapies, as reported by Erin Quinn in Natural Solutions magazine, would not have happened without the personal involvement and guidance of her integrative oncologist.
Maria Claudia is a physician. Yet she knew little about integrative medicine and hardly anything about complementary therapies for cancer patients. She was actually surprised by her oncologist’s recommendations for natural therapies by specialists in addition to her chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery. The oncologist would treat her with the traditional conventional therapies, but she would see at least five other medical professionals for complementary therapies. As a doctor, she had never considered therapies such as mind-body interaction, special diet and nutrition protocols, hypnotherapy, acupuncture, and biofeedback. Although skeptical at first, she now credits these complementary therapies as essential contributors to her present classification as a cancer survivor.
The holistic approach to cancer treatment by her integrative oncologist is still rare in America today. By and large, cancer patients receive treatments that attempt to kill the tumor or eradicate the cancer cells from the blood or skeletal system. Oncologists don’t typically treat the patient; they treat the disease. Yet, it is the patient that ultimately has to overcome the disease. Chemotherapy and radiation helps, but so does attention to the whole body, psyche, and environment.
Maria Claudia testifies that she is living proof that cancer patients need conventional medicine and complementary therapies to beat the disease. This is the new strategy for winning the war on cancer.