Beating Cancer with Nutrition. - Review - book review

Alternative Medicine Review, April, 2001 by Kathleen Head

Beating Cancer with Nutrition By Patrick Quillin, PhD, RD, with Noreen Quillin

Nutrition Times Press, Inc. PO Box 700512, Tulsa, OK 74170-0512 phone: 918-495-1137; fax: 918-477-7790; www.4nutrition.com ISBN 0-9638372-8-1; Soft cover, 348 pages; $24.95

Patrick Quillin has emerged with a newly-updated version of his informative book, Beating Cancer with Nutrition. As he states, "Chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery can temporarily reduce tumor burden, but these therapies do not change the underlying causes of the disease. Comprehensive cancer treatment must include an aggressive nutrition component, which can increase life expectancy by 12 to 21 fold along with better chances for complete remission." To that end, the book outlines a nutritional strategy to accomplish these goals. Dr. Quillin speaks from a decade of experience as Director of Nutrition for Cancer Treatment Centers of America (CTCA). The approach at CTCA is to use conventional therapies combined with nutritional approaches to improved their effects and/or offset the side effects of the potentially toxic protocols.

The book outlines strategies for: (1) decreasing the toxic effects of chemotherapy and radiation with specific nutrients; (2) starving the cancer by lowering glucose through dietary changes and supplements; and (3) decreasing the tumor burden with the use of anticancer nutrients and botanicals. Included is a table listing some of the common symptoms experienced by cancer patients (either because of the disease or because of the treatment), and outlining conventional medications typically prescribed and their natural counterparts. Noreen Quillin provides a chapter on nutritious, good-tasting recipes, along with tips for gaining weight, losing weight, and eating out. Appendices include a list of reference books on nutrition and cancer, a partial list of nutrition-oriented practitioners, information on mail order nutritional products, and a list of cancer referral agencies.

The book is well referenced and spiced with numerous case reports. For the person who may be too sick, tired, or busy to sit down and read the book, an audio CD is also included. Dr. Quillin states that at least 40-percent of cancer patients die from malnutrition. With this in mind, it seems imperative that oncologists and general practitioners give more attention to nutrition and how it affects their patients. Reading Beating Cancer with Nutrition is a good place to begin to educate themselves as well as their patients.