I learned the other day that B17 has been proven to act as a cancer preventive/treatment. The one source that I'm familiar with is apricot seeds (given: you have to bust it open to get to the kernel). In many cultures in Asia, the seed is used as a means of treating the likes of constipation and cough. But its consumption is also linked to little or no disease and longevity. Some Indian and Asian cultures have (before interaction with the western culture) been known to have the elderly living to 160 years old while the western world was pulling only 60 or 70 at best. Could it be that vitamins and minerals are not merely necessities to keep the body operating but preventive factors? Is it possible that diseases are merely nutrient deficiencies--each disease corresponding with either a the lack of a single or an absent unique set of vitamins or minerals? It's quite possible that we're looking in the wrong place to treat and cure/prevent cancer.

When I was in high school, we studied cardiology for a long period of time (ask me about my hematology lab/clinical practicum gone bad) as a part of our skeletal muscle unit study. While working with dissection specimens and pinning out every imaginable muscle and tendon, we poured over college course work and text books (my A&P teacher was a firm believer in pushing the potential of young minds and I thank him for it). One night, I sat in my room cramming for an exam and wondered how it was that the heart never suffered from cancer. It occurred to me that it seemed that most other organs could have cancer: lungs, liver, intestines, etc., But why not the heart? Did it have something to do with its constant motion and movement to pump blood?

I bring this up because after listening to Eva Vertes' talk on stem cells, I think she's right. She has the answer. Cancer could very well be the direct result of injury (Smoking = lung cancer. Alcohol = liver cancer. Bone fracture = bone cancer.) and it could be the body's repair mechanism gone awry. Cancer stem cells, despite their great potential could also be agents of destruction in the future of medicine. Think about it. Tumors begin from stem cell. Stem cells can differentiate into different cells that are responding to injury. Cancer is the the product of the body responding to and attempting to repair tissue or an organ but the process is not controlled.

In today's treatments, we're focusing on the elimination of cancer with radiology and chemotherapy when subsequently is adding more damage to the body despite removing the cancerous cells. We are bombarding the body with chemical, radiation and other harmful agents. Instead, Vertes suggests we consider manipulation rather than elimination. The goal would then be to cause these cells to instead be able to fully differentiate and to repair themselves thus repairing the organ or tissue.

Now, how is it that skeletal muscle (including the heart) never gets cancer? It comprises over 50% of the body! Turns out, any case of cancerous skeletal muscle is rare and that skeletal muscle is actually resistent to cancer. And it's not only to cancer but metastasis, the spread of cancer from its place of origin to other sites in the body. So why doesn't cancer go to these cells? Vertes asked the scientific community and was given the answer that those cells were probably that way because they were terminally differentiated cells. However, she retorted that it couldn't be the case. Brain cells/nervous tissue is terminally differentiated and still gets cancer. She instead asked if it was because skeletal muscles have blood vessels that serve as a highway system; the more vessels and blood supply they have, the more they're favorable they are for cancer or mets? Well, cancer requires angiogenesis as a means for obtaining a blood supply and for the pathogenesis of cancer. Otherwise, they remain the size of a pinpoint and are not harmful.

According to her research, skeletal muscles experience only about 16% of micro mets, but only 1.6% of that is actual metastasis. Perhaps skeletal muscle is able to control the angiogenesis and control the tumors. Consider the fact that we use these muscles almost all the time. Is it possible that the muscle knows that it needs blood supply to sustain its operations and therefore it can control these blood vessels? The heart is always beating, always moving...and it's selfish with its blood supply. Can this "selfishness" be an anti-angiogenic factor? Or is there an anti-angio routing factor that governs where tumors grow?

Tumors move and grow based on the chemokine network and chemical signals. They express receptors and a corresponding chemokines in an organ are avail. somewhere in the body. They then migrate there and begin growth. Interestingly, skeletal muscles do not express these molecules and tumors aren't found there. Vertes believes that we can utilize this factor and apply it to cancer therapy. When skeletal muscle is injured it expresses the chemokines and draws "cancer" to it. But skeletal muscle has a unique difference. It is able to actually fully differentiate the cells and repair. Its resistance to cancer of the skeletal muscles could be due to the fact that skeletal muscle has myoD that can differentiate into muscle cells (convert cell types into skeletal muscle). Tumor cells respond to to skeletal muscle but once in contact, myoD acts upon them and causes them to become skeletal cells. Essentially, tumor cells are being used to repair the muscle. Skeletal muscle has adapted to respond to injury and fine tuned the differentiation and finish the process of self-repair. It's the body's own repair system and we should not be looking at cancer as something to destroy and radiate. We need to manipulate it. Bacterial or other foreign objects can't be looked at in this manner because they are from outside of the human body. They need to be eliminated.

But in the future, Vertes states that we could think of cancer as a therapy. In the case of deterioration of tissue, we can restore new tissue (like brain cells) by using cancer and putting it into the brain and having them differentiate into brain cells...if we can piece together all the right factors. We need to know that stem cells placed in cancered organs or tissue will only facilitate the spread of the disorder. Instead, we need to work with the body's natural system of order and assist it in self-repair and healing.

This is where I think deficiencies come into play. By holistically working with the body, we not only significantly reduce the amount of manmade synthetic chemicals and other harmful toxins in the body, but we also allow the body to self-regulate and strengthen itself. Nutrients (micro and macro) could very well be the key to controlling the mechanisms that can allow the medical world to eventually use "cancer" as a restorative therapy, if we can determine how various combinations correspond with and can manipulate the body's physiology. Time to start the research.

Any thoughts?