Are researchers hiding the truth on breast cancer treatment?
Breast cancer. Those words have the ability to send a chill up your spine unlike any other two words in the English language.
It’s rare to meet a person whose life hasn’t been touched in some way by this terrible disease. According to the American Cancer Society, one out of every eight American women will face the frightening news of a breast cancer diagnosis at some point in their lives.
When women are diagnosed with breast cancer, one of the first questions out of their mouths tends to be, “When do I start chemotherapy?”
And, believe me, I get it. Chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery have been heralded by drug companies and the physicians who worship at the altar of Big Pharma as some of the greatest medical breakthroughs of the past century.
Well, you’re going to want to sit down for what I tell you next.
According to a new study in the Annals of Oncology, dozens of breast cancer researchers have engaged in a pattern of obvious — and presumably intentional — deceit as they reported their research findings.
In plain English, they lied. On purpose.
A research team headed by a leading scientist from the Ontario Cancer Institute found that medical journals are reporting inaccurate — or at least incomplete — information, as breast cancer researchers hide key facts.
“Investigators want to go overboard to make their studies look positive,” Ian Tannock, a senior author of the study, told Reuters in a brave and candid admission that surely will not win him any fans among his peers.
Tannock and his team reviewed 164 breast cancer studies and found that in a staggering two-thirds of cases, researchers failed to include any — that’s right, any — information about the serious side effects of chemotherapy, radiation, or surgery in their abstract summaries. A full one-fifth of studies omitted information about significant side effects from their results tables.
Why are these omissions so important? Because researchers know that most busy doctors only read the abstracts of studies — and those who read beyond the abstracts often skip right to the results tables. There was a fairly blatant attempt to ensure the typical reader wouldn’t catch on to the harmful cancer treatment side effects that researchers uncovered during their work.
Despicable, right? Criminal even? It gets worse.
Tannock said that what surprised him most was that in a third of the studies he and his colleagues reviewed, if researchers did not get the results they hoped for, they simply changed their goals. They reported results that were, in many cases, completely different from what the studies were designed to test.
Why would research scientists engage in such shady dealings? The answer is as simple as it is predictable — they did it for money and influence. And plenty of both.
It’s no secret, Tannock said, that researchers “gain more influence with positive studies.” And in an industry where researchers are constantly hunting for tenured jobs, publication credits, or the next big grant, influence is everything.
Influence with Big Pharma and their deep research pockets is what many scientists are after. Researchers conducting studies sponsored by drug companies often feel tremendous pressure to report positive results.
I know that deciding on a course of cancer treatment is difficult and deeply personal. These are decisions that I hope you never have to make.
But before your doctor recommends chemotherapy, radiation, or surgery, you deserve — at the very least — a full accounting of the risks. And you need to know that there appears to have been an effort to hide this information from the very people providing your care.
There are alternative and safe breast cancer treatments like iodine, which kills breast cancer cells while leaving normal cells intact. And if you are enduring chemotherapy, take a moment to visit Dr. Wright’s website at www.wrightnewsletter.com and search “chemotherapy” for a wealth of advice on simple things you can talk to your doctor about doing — such as taking herbal supplements or fish oil — to feel better quickly.
There are many simple, natural products that can help with breast cancer treatment side effects — side effects that, sadly, some researchers hoped you’d never learn about.
Yours in good health,
Bob Reagan
If you like what you read, please consider donating to help support my blog, even as little as $5 will help.