Evaluation of pancreatic proteolytic enzyme treatment of adenocarcinoma

BIO 02-30 02-306282 NDN- 199-0006-1245-8

Gonzalez, Nicholas James; Isaacs, Linda Lee
JOURNAL NAME- Nutrition and Cancer
VOL. 33
NO. 2
1999
PP. 117-124.
DOCUMENT TYPE- Article
ISSN- 0163-5581
LANGUAGE- ENGLISH
Historically, large doses of proteolytic enzymes, along with diet,
nutritional supplements, and "detoxification" procedures, have been used in
alternative therapies to treat all forms of cancer, without formal clinical
studies to support their use. A 2-year, unblinded, 1-treatment arm,
10-patient, pilot prospective case study was used to assess survival in
patients suffering inoperable stage II-IV pancreatic adenocarcinoma treated
with large doses of orally ingested pancreatic enzymes, nutritional
supplements, "detoxification" procedures, and an organic diet. From January
1993 to April 1996 in the authors' private practice, 10 patients with
inoperable, biopsy-proven pancreatic adenocarcinoma were entered into the
trial. After one patient dropped out, an 11th patient was added to the study
(however, all 11 are considered in the data tabulation). Patients followed
the treatment at home, under the supervision of the authors. As of 12
January 1999, of 11 patients entered into the study, 9(81%) survived one
year, 5 (45%) survived two years, and at this time, 4 have survived three
years. Two patients are alive and doing well: one at three years and the
other at four years. These results are far above the 25% survival at one
year and 10% survival at two years for all stages of pancreatic
adenocarcinoma reported in the National Cancer Data Base from 1995. This
pilot study suggests that an aggressive nutritional therapy with large doses
of pancreatic enzymes led to significantly increased survival over what
would normally be expected for patients with inoperable pancreatic
adenocarcinoma.